Personalized medicine: health tailored to our needs

Let’s imagine a simple gesture like buying shoes. We will agree that, in the medium and long term, we will be better served and even save money if we choose high-quality shoes, made to measure, taking into account the particularities of our feet and our daily needs. With due regard for proportions, this is precisely what personalized medicine offers to our health.

Based on each person’s unique genetic profile, as well as their environment and lifestyle, personalized medicine allows the development of “tailor-made” therapies, increasing their effectiveness and reducing side effects. But it is not limited to treatment: it also allows the risk of disease to be anticipated even before symptoms appear, and contributes to more accurate diagnoses. These unique characteristics represent an undeniable advantage for people with diseases, who gain more years of life and a better quality of life and experience fewer adverse effects associated with treatments.

The benefits also extend to healthcare systems. Despite the initial investment, the medium- to long-term benefits are multiple: early detection of the disease allows strategies to be drawn up to prevent its progression or slow its advance. More accurate diagnoses — often possible with non-invasive methods, such as simply taking a drop of blood — reduce uncertainty, allowing for more efficient use of resources and less waste of medicines.

There is another very important benefit: personalized medicine deepens our knowledge of disease mechanisms, paving the way for more effective and targeted therapies. What might seem like a vision of the future is already a reality, thanks to advances in the collection and analysis of molecular and genetic information. Technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning allow us to integrate and interpret vast volumes of data, combining genetic, clinical and behavioral information — a revolution in healthcare.

In Portugal, it is already a reality to treat oncological diseases based on the multiple variables that cause them, rather than limiting them to their anatomical location. An example of this is CAR-T cell therapies, used in the treatment of lymphomas and leukemias. In this process, the patient's own cells are modified so that they recognize and specifically attack tumor cells.

This advanced form of immunotherapy has demonstrated high success rates. However, access to these therapies in Portugal faces major logistical and economic obstacles, as the country currently does not have the capacity to develop or manufacture them.

Another innovation that is already available is genomic sequencing, applied to patients who have exhausted conventional treatment options. Genetic testing is also now available to detect mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes, which significantly increase the risk of developing breast and ovarian cancer, which allows preventive measures to be taken that can prevent the development of the disease.

But personalized and precision medicine goes far beyond oncology. In areas such as cardiovascular diseases, neurology, psychiatry and chronic pain, it is now possible to adjust treatments to each patient's genetic profile, which increases the effectiveness of therapies and reduces side effects. Genetic testing also allows for the early identification of rare diseases, enabling the development of personalized therapies. Even in the field of infectious diseases, this approach allows for the identification of genetic variants of both the infectious agent and the host, which facilitates the selection of more effective antivirals or antibiotics and contributes to the reduction of antimicrobial resistance – one of the greatest challenges in medicine today.

These are just a few examples of the enormous potential of this clinical approach, which provides the right therapy at the right time. And this will be precisely the theme of the third session of the Innovation Talks series – “Personalized Medicine: is the future now?”, promoted by the Health in Dialogue Platform, with the support of AstraZeneca, on June 27th, at 9:30 am, at the Auditorium of the Order of Pharmacists, in Lisbon.

Personalised medicine literacy, both among healthcare professionals and people living with the disease, is essential. Only with knowledge and training will it be possible to promote widespread access to it.

Focusing on the individual to treat the disease is already the present – ​​and will, without a doubt, be the future of medicine.

Jaime Melancia, president of the board of directors of the Health in Dialogue Platform