Category: prevention

Preventive medicine can be more precise and precision medicine can be more preventive!

a person being magnified in a crowd with a magnifying glass and a doctor holding a stethoscope on the crowd with DNA

In a recent JAMA viewpoint, Psaty and coauthors compare precision medicine and preventive medicine as two distinct models in medicine and public health. They use the example of hemophilia B to illustrate how new gene therapy can successfully target treatment with high specific-activity factor IX variant. They contrast this model of precision medicine with the Read More >

Posted on by Muin J Khoury, Director, Office of Public Health Genomics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention1 Comment

Using Genomics in Precision Prevention of Breast Cancer

Hands joined in circle holding breast cancer struggle symbol and surrounded by DNA

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women in the United States. It is estimated that 3%-5% of breast cancer cases are hereditary, most often involving mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. Such mutations confer high lifetime risk of breast and ovarian cancer. The United States Preventive Services Task Force has issued specific recommendations Read More >

Posted on by Muin J Khoury, Director, Office of Public Health Genomics and Lisa C Richardson, Director, Division of Cancer Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and PreventionLeave a commentTags

Nobody is average but what to do about it? The challenge of individualized disease prevention based on genomics

Nobody is Average- a normal distribution curve with figures inside it and DNA as the curve

  Each week, Garrison Keillor shares with National Public Radio listeners the latest news from Lake Wobegon where “all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average.” The concept of “average” is deeply rooted in our scientific analysis of all health related traits such as height, Read More >

Posted on by Muin J Khoury, Director, Office of Public Health Genomics, Centers for Disease Control and PreventionLeave a commentTags , ,