HEALTHCARE MANAGEMENT
GREATER DIAGNOSTIC AND THERAPEUTIC PRECISION WITH TECHNOLOGY Integrating genomic insights within healthcare workflows
Precision medicine has gained momentum ever since the human genome was mapped in 2003. However, patient genomic data can be difficult to access at the point of care with its complex vocabularies. This is where cloud-based technology can step in, to strengthen and empower the delivery of healthcare that can better place genomic insights at its core Joel Diamond, Co-Founder and Chief Medical Officer, 2bPrecise
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ur healthcare environment today is made up of complex health needs and healthcare systems which are often put to the test. Generally, there are underlying expectations placed on the medical industry about what would dominate the next era of healthcare. Even before the pandemic brought into the spotlight the sustainability of healthcare delivery, there has been a gradual paradigm shift towards patient-centred and personalised care, where individuals themselves are more involved than ever in the treatment and services that they receive.
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A SI A N H O S P I T A L & H EA LT HCA R E M A N AGE M E N T
One such practice the evolution of healthcare has brought about, which puts patient-centricity at its core, is precision medicine. It is an emerging approach to medical care that integrates unique genetic make-up, lifestyle and environmental factors to determine the best medical strategy(ies) to use for a health condition. While the term precision medicine is relatively new, one component – the concept of understanding a person’s genetics to determine the best approach to prevent, diagnose and treat disease – is not. Blood type, for example, is coded in one’s DNA,
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and for decades has been key to ensuring that an individual who needs a blood transfusion can receive blood safely from a matching donor. Identifying select gene mutations in one’s DNA, can also show if an individual has a likely genetic predisposition to skin conditions such as eczema or other diseases including cancer, haemochromatosis and sickle cell anemia. The aim with precision medicine is to provide personalised treatment that is more likely to improve effectiveness and patient outcomes for each patient, compared with reactive cookie-cutter or sluggish trial-and-error approaches.
