Precision Medicine is arguably one of the most promising shifts to take place in the healthcare industry, as the industry experiences constant change daily. Currently, this approach to treatment is remodeling the perception of health care, eliminating the concept of mass treatment. Based on an individual’s gene, lifestyle and environment, precision medicine provides better treatment plan and less invasive treatment options to patients.

Also called as tailored or targeted therapy, precision medicine is a medical discipline in which the treatment depends on internal and environmental characteristics of the patients. Traditional medicine, on the other hand, is rigid in that it involves some general emphasized guidelines, while precision medicine involves seizing on specific treatments that are most appropriate within a particular person.

In traditional medicine, physicians tend to use treatments produced from averages to treat patients. With precision medicine, the idea is to dig further than that in order to devise a treatment regime that is tailored to the patient’s biology. This could mean the difference between a treatment that is effective and one which doesn’t help much.

Genetic testing is the central feature of precision medicine. This explains that for a long, a doctor needs to study a body of a patient to see if they will befit in a specific treatment or not. This could mean more precise diagnosis and allow the doctors to select treatments which are more likely to succeed.

For instance, in cancer treatment, genetic testing can tell the physicians the gens in cancerous cells to enable them to use targeted therapies that are lethal to such mutations. Using this approach, the probability of success is raised while that of harming the normal tissues is also reduced – a factor that cannot be said for the conventional forms of treatment such as chemotherapy.

Precision medicine is not only changing oncology – it’s changing how patients with chronic conditions are cared for, too. Diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and autoimmune diseases have an impact in quite distinct manners. It may be effective for one patient and not for the other, so here is where precision medicine steps in.

Genetic testing enables physicians to learn about possible input of genes to the reaction of an individual to certain drugs. This enables them to recommend correct treatments and exclude those with side effects or with which may lead to some complications. This approach it enables patient to deal with their illness in the appropriate manner and hence enjoy a healthier lifestyle.

It must be mentioned that cancer treatment is one of the most successful application fields of precision medicine. From the genome sequencing of the tumor, the doctors are able to discover the kind of therapies that can be used to treat that particular tumor. These approaches have already paid off in the form of targeted therapy and immunotherapy that can operate in manners that are different from other types of treatment.

These treatments are more specific and are likely to produce lesser side effects compared to the standard cancer therapies that are normally broad based. From the patient perspective this would mean less hospitalization, less pain and better overall results.

As with any promising medical approach, precision medicine comes with its set of problems. The most significant challenge is the costs that the project entails. Cancer related genetic testing and individualized therapy may be costly, and not all patients may afford these advanced forms of treatment. This can lead to discriminations between the patients as well as reduce chances of receiving the benefits from the idea of precision medicine.

Thirdly, the research field is relatively recent. Although the advances in understanding the genetic basis of disease are vast, we are still far from knowing all there is to know. Not all the genetic variations that are responsible for such diseases have been understood fully and to get the best out of the genetic variations and the treatment that is offered to the patient more research has to be done.

The health care industry in the future seems set to become even more client-oriented. In the future, we will observe the increase in the number of targeted therapies and advancements in the field of precision medicine with the help of additional knowledge about genetic factor. Some advanced technology, such as artificial intelligence and big data, assist doctors in making better expectations regarding the patient’s conditions.

Molecular diagnostics, wearables and health monitoring devices are also becoming much more involved in the field of precision medicine. These devices collect real time information and can assist doctors in decisions in order to target therapeutic interventions still even more effectively.

Precision medicine is not simply the talk of the decade – it is the new paradigm in the world of medicine. Switching from the conventional system of mass treatment to delivering tailor-made treatment plans, precision medicine is offering much better chances of success, let alone to patients with complicated or long-term illnesses.

Although much remains to be done even in this area, the prospects of accuracy in medicine are staggering. Looking at how this area is advancing, one can only imagine how the delivery of health care will be more customized and how treatments will therefore improve as the quality of life to patients in every corner of the world improves.