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PharmGKB Staff

Evidence of pharmacogenetics in aiding polypharmacy outcomes

Many drugs interact with the same enzymes and transporters. As a result, variation in the genes encoding these proteins can affect risks of side effects and likelihood of treatment success for patients taking many medications. These interactions may be different and not necessarily predicted from trials of single drugs. Knowing

Top 100 Prescribed Drugs with CPIC Guidelines

Pharmacogenetics has important consequences for some of the most commonly prescribed medications. Depending on the source and structure of the list, the 100 most commonly prescribed drugs include between 3 (RxList from the Medscape report of August 2014 http://www.rxlist.com/script/main/hp.asp ) and 16 (Pharmacy student

The Wall Street Journal Discusses PGx

An article in the Wall Street Journal this week by Health Editor Melinda Beck called “Is Your Medicine Right for Your Metabolism?” discusses the current state of pharmacogenetics and obstacles to implementation of pharmacogenetics (PGx) in routine clinical care. The article and an accompanying video explain that variations in enzymes

Integrating PGx throughout the Drug Development Process

Nelson, et al. argue for integrating more pharmacogenomic research into drug screening and the pre-approval process, with benefits for patient outcomes and drug development. Their article “The genetics of drug efficacy: opportunities and challenges,” published this week in Nature Reviews Genetics reviews currently known associations of genetic variants with drug

The Precision Medicine Initiative: Consultative PGx and Data Sharing at Stanford University

On February 25th, one year after the announcement of the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI), the White House hosted the Precision Medicine Summit. A White House press release described how various public and private groups will be taking steps to advance the goals of the PMI. As part of the PMI

A Study of the Transcriptomic Variation Affecting Pharmacogenes

In an effort to capture differences in the expression of pharmacogenes between individuals and between tissue types and to characterize novel pharmacogene splice variants, researchers conducted a transcriptomic analysis of 389 pharmacologically important genes in liver, kidney (cortex), heart (left ventricle), and adipose tissue from 139 individuals as well as

January SNPits Summary

The January issue of SNPits, the University of Florida’s Personalized Medicine Program e-newsletter, summarizes pharmacogenetics studies. The first is a 2009 article from the journal Gastroenterology. The authors conducted a multi center, randomized controlled trial whereby patients were given high or low-dose celecoxib, or placebo, and were followed up

The Pharmacogenetic Phenome Compendium, A Chemical–Genetic Interaction Map

Development of new drugs is a complicated and difficult process, with many initially promising compounds falling by the wayside due to unforeseen off-target or genotype-specific effects. In an effort to address some of these problems a new paper by Breinig et. al. describes a high-throughput process for screening small molecules

ACMG Issues a Revised Position Statement Regarding DTC Genetic Testing

The American College of Medical Genetics (ACMG) recently revised its position statement regarding direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing. Briefly, the ACMG recommends that: * Knowledgeable professionals order the genetic test, which should be undertaken by a Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) accredited laboratory. * Board certified genetics experts, such as clinical geneticists, or

ASHP Foundation Recognizes Clinical Implementation of PGx

The University of Illinois (UI) Personalized Medicine Program led by Dr. Edith Nutescu, is one of three finalists for the 2015 Award for Excellence in Medication-Use Safety, which is given by the American Society of Health-Systems Pharmacists (ASHP) Foundation. The program at the UI Hospital and Health Sciences System has