Ethical issues in personalized medicine

The search for personalized medicine is not a new phenomenon, but it is only with developments in genetic knowledge – and pharmacogenomics in particular – that the ‘personalization project’ stands a realistic chance of improving health on a wide scale. Despite recent advances, the risk of hype is still present, as can be seen by expectations and claims surrounding direct-to-consumer genetic testing. 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: a study has been able to identify individual research participants from stored genetic data.