Using Genetics to Personalize Treatment
My Drug Genome is your resource to learn about how genetics may affect the way medications work and how genetic results can be incorporated into personalized patient care. Part of personalized medicine means ensuring that patients receive the right dose of the right medication for them.
What is PREDICT? The Pharmacogenomic Resource for Enhanced Decisions in Care & Treatment (PREDICT) initiative empowers patients and doctors with the genetic information needed to anticipate and prevent adverse drug reactions or lack of effectiveness based on genetic information specific to each patient tested.
Why now? Genetic variation is an increasingly well-recognized contributor to variability in drug response and adverse drug reactions. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recognizes many of these associations. Currently at least 70 drugs have pharmacogenomic information in their FDA labels that affects prescribing.
What is the goal of PREDICT? The long-term goal of PREDICT is to incorporate clinically actionable genetic data into the VUMC electronic medical record and implement guidance for clinical decisions utilizing those pharmacogenomic results.
What is tested through PREDICT? Using one blood test, patients are genotyped for 38 common polymorphisms within 10 genes associated with drug absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion. This single genetic test has repeated utility over the lifetime of the patient. Currently, the test provides data pertinent to 18 drugs, with additional drug-gene interactions continuously being added to the program. When new content is added, re-ordering as a non-duplicative test is possible. Only results for genes that have been reviewed and approved as actionable by Vanderbilt’s Pharmacy and Therapeutics subcommittees will be released into the patient chart.
Does this program include cancer testing? No. The PREDICT program tests for germline genetic variants (the genes you are born with) and not cancer mutations. Cancer testing is now being performed at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC). VICC is one of the first cancer centers in the nation to offer cancer patients routine genotyping of their tumors at the DNA level. MyCancerGenome.org is an online personalized cancer medicine resource and decision-making tool for physicians, patients, caregivers and researchers that gives up-to-date information on what mutations make cancers grow and matches tumor mutations to therapies.
Are you interested in a referral? The PREDICT test is available to Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) patients and providers. Specialists are available at the VUMC Genomics and Therapeutics Clinic (GATC) to help advise you on how you could use pharmacogenomic results like the PREDICT test to support your healthcare. Please have your healthcare provider contact the Genomics and Therapeutics Clinic at GATC@vumc.org or visit the webpage for more information and a referral.
QUICK FACTS ABOUT PREDICT
- Frequently Asked Questions for Providers and Staff
- Vanderbilt’s Promise of Discovery messages