Barriers and Solutions in Clinical Implementation of Pharmacogenomics for Personalized Medicine

Nowadays, it is the trend for medical development to develop personalized medicine, and pharmacogenomics is one of the main driving forces. In recent years, with the rapid development of pharmacogenomics, increasing biomarkers related to drug efficacy and toxicity have been discovered, which makes individualized treatment in clinic become possible. Using these biomarkers to guide clinical medication is expected to improve the efficacy and safety of some drugs, and reduce side effects and medical costs. Although a lot of drug labels have been identified based on pharmacogenomics research, only a few drugs used in clinic have considered its pharmacogenomics information. There are still many barriers in the widespread promotion and application of pharmacogenomics research results in clinical practice. Recently, the major barriers included information technology, scientific research, education, ethnic differences as well as policies and regulations. In this chapter, we will detail the major barriers associated with the clinical application of pharmacogenomics and their possible solutions.