Realities of Pharmacogenomic and Minimizing Misconceptions and Medication Misadventures

Pharmacogenetics allows providers to enhance their treatment decisions for common medications used in certain conditions such as depression, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), pain, and acute lymphoblastic leukemia. A precision medicine approach combines pharmacogenetics (when appropriate) with other clinical and environmental factors to minimize trial-and-error of treatment. Public awareness of the impact of pharmacogenetics on treatment decisions is growing, and healthcare should be aware of the resources supporting it. Pharmacogenetics may seem daunting, but the accessibility of pharmacogenetic testing has improved with growing availability of evidence-based clinical recommendations, pharmacogenetic tests, clinical decision support resources, insurance coverage, and digestible education materials. As precision medicine and precision public health expands over the next decade, pharmacogenetic testing will continuously grow to be cheaper and part of routine genetic or genomic screenings, and be another common test—like liver or kidney function tests—that can enhance treatment decisions.