Toward precision medicine and health: Opportunities and challenges in allergic diseases

Abstract

Abstract"Precision Medicine" (also called "Personalized", "Stratified" or "P4" Medicine) can be defined as the tailoring of preventive measures and medical treatments to the characteristics of each patient to obtain the best clinical outcome for each person while, ideally, also enhancing the costeffectiveness of such interventions for individuals and society. Clearly, the "best clinical outcome" in allergic diseases is not to get them in the first place. To emphasize the importance of disease prevention, a critical component of Precision Medicine can be referred to as "Precision Health", defined herein as the use of all available information pertaining to specific individuals (including family history, individual genetic and other biometric information, and exposures to risk factors for developing or exacerbating disease), as well as features of their environments, to sustain and enhance health and prevent the development of disease. In this article, I will provide a personal perspective on how the "Precision Health-Precision Medicine" approach can be applied to the related goals of preventing the development of allergic disorders and providing the most effective diagnosis, "disease monitoring", and care for those who suffer from these prevalent diseases. I will also mention some of the existing and potential challenges to achieving these ambitious goals.