Ruth Chadwick, the author of “Drug Discovery Today: Therapeutic Strategies”, revealed her concerns for the personalized medicine movement, “The move towards personalized medicine may disadvantage some patients in some social contexts, by shifting the allocation of resources in the health care system. Risks also surround the increasing accumulation of health data that goes hand in hand with personalized medicine” (Chadwick 171). Chadwick refers to the collection of personal DNA test information, “accumulation of healthcare data” as a risk; however, with the increased informational knowledge brought in by personalized medicine testing, cancer or other incurable diseases could benefit from an increased database of information. The risks mentioned by Chadwick may elude to an ethical argument for the increased concerns as personalized medicine comes to mainstream healthcare. Ideally, the increase in genetic testing among individuals through the implementation of personalized medicine would bring in massive amounts of information regarding the precursors for diseases and cancer allowing medical attention to become more accurate. However the use of the extensive personal knowledge could conflict with the patients rights to confidentiality through the use of electronic health records, which are susceptible to hacking and breaches (Chadwick). Other issues regarding confidentiality about the patient’s genetic information can be seen in inter family sharing. Because a patient's genetic makeup carries relation to other family members regarding hereditary disease, the issue then lies with whether or not those family member should be informed of their possibility to develop a life altering disease. Allowing personal genetic information to be shared between families may also pave the way for other institutions to find a way to
Ruth Chadwick, the author of “Drug Discovery Today: Therapeutic Strategies”, revealed her concerns for the personalized medicine movement, “The move towards personalized medicine may disadvantage some patients in some social contexts, by shifting the allocation of resources in the health care system. Risks also surround the increasing accumulation of health data that goes hand in hand with personalized medicine” (Chadwick 171). Chadwick refers to the collection of personal DNA test information, “accumulation of healthcare data” as a risk; however, with the increased informational knowledge brought in by personalized medicine testing, cancer or other incurable diseases could benefit from an increased database of information. The risks mentioned by Chadwick may elude to an ethical argument for the increased concerns as personalized medicine comes to mainstream healthcare. Ideally, the increase in genetic testing among individuals through the implementation of personalized medicine would bring in massive amounts of information regarding the precursors for diseases and cancer allowing medical attention to become more accurate. However the use of the extensive personal knowledge could conflict with the patients rights to confidentiality through the use of electronic health records, which are susceptible to hacking and breaches (Chadwick). Other issues regarding confidentiality about the patient’s genetic information can be seen in inter family sharing. Because a patient's genetic makeup carries relation to other family members regarding hereditary disease, the issue then lies with whether or not those family member should be informed of their possibility to develop a life altering disease. Allowing personal genetic information to be shared between families may also pave the way for other institutions to find a way to