An Inter-Professional Approach to Personalized Medicine Education: One Institution’S Experience

Abstract

Personalized medicine offers the promise of better diagnoses, targeted therapies and individualized treatment plans. Pharmacogenomics is an integral component of personalized medicine; it aids in the prediction of an individual’s response to medications. Despite growing public acceptance and emerging clinical evidence, this rapidly expanding field of medicine is slow to be adopted and utilized by healthcare providers, although many believe that they should be knowledgeable and able to apply pharmacogenomics in clinical practice. Institutional infrastructure must be built to support pharmacogenomic implementation. Multidisciplinary education for healthcare providers is a critical component for pharmacogenomics to achieve its full potential to optimize patient care. We describe our recent experience at the Mayo Clinic implementing pharmacogenomics education in a large, academic healthcare system facilitated by the Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine.

Clinical Application and Educational Training for Pharmacogenomics

“…Recognizing the importance of uptake outside of pharmacy, the Mayo Clinic described a process to improve education among all health care providers [ 27 ]. This study stressed the value of interprofessional education and collaboration to solve problems in the organization regarding PGx [ 27 ]. Pharmacists in the institution were provided online training regarding the latest developments in PGx [ 27 ].…”

Precision pharmacotherapy: Integrating pharmacogenomics into clinical pharmacy practice

“…Moreover, numerous publications now provide detailed descriptions of clinical pharmacogenomic implementation models, educational programs, and clinical research methods . A 2015 American Society of Health‐System Pharmacists position statement delineated pharmacists' responsibilities and functions in clinical pharmacogenomics .…”

Education and Knowledge in Pharmacogenomics: Still a Challenge?

“…Varied educational approaches for different learner types can improve effectiveness. We relied heavily on our champions, educational research, and discussions with the practice to create a prioritization schema and identify appropriate content, instructional design, and delivery methods . To support pharmacogenomics in practice, point‐of‐care education to support prescribing, and CDS alerts were developed early, followed by concepts that are more foundational.…”

“…The Mayo Clinic is a large, tertiary care center and care team members at Mayo Clinic including physicians, pharmacists, advanced practice providers, and nurses share similar concerns regarding pharmacogenomics knowledge and education . Identifying and creating pharmacogenomics education that is timely, relevant, up‐to‐date, concise, and effective is an ongoing challenge.…”