RECENT TRENDS IN CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES OF PHARMACOGENOMICS

Pharmacogenomics is the branch of pharmacology and genomics that deals with the influence of genetic variation on drug response in patients by correlating molecular expressions and single-nucleotide polymorphisms with a drug’s efficacy or toxicity. Pharmacogenomics aims to develop rational means to optimize drug therapy, with respect to the patients’ genotype, to ensure maximum efficacy with minimal adverse effects. Such approaches promise the advent of “personalized medicine”; in which drugs and drug combinations are optimized for each individual’s unique genetic makeup. Pharmacogenomics is the whole genome application of pharmacokinetics, which examines the single gene interactions with drugs. Pharmacogenomics has a high potential to revolutionize cancer therapy. Some of the examples of genetic variations in drug metabolizing enzymes and drug targets described appear to play major roles in influencing drug efficacy or toxicity. In addition to the single gene variations described above, identification of genetic profiles to subtype the breast cancer and to identify the prognosis by microarray analysis has shown great promise towards individualized cancer therapy. Pharmacogenomics is the study of how an individual’s genetic inheritance affects the body’s response to drugs. The term comes from the words pharmacology and genomics and is thus the intersection of pharmaceuticals and genetics.