Category: precision public health
2020: A Challenging Year of Progress for Genomics and Precision Public Health

It is time to wrap up an eventful 2020 which unfortunately was dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic. From January 2020 through November 2020, we saw a major increase in visits to our website (> 2.6 million views, compared to 2 million views in 2019 and 1.2 million views in 2018). In our year end blog, Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentA Strong Start: Enhancing Newborn Screening for Precision Public Health

As the capability to sequence an individual’s genome or exome continues to expand—and the cost continues to fall—more states are considering how next generation sequencing (NGS) could support their newborn screening programs, which test approximately four million babies born in the United States each year for congenital, treatable diseases. Results from NGS can help enhance Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentPrecision Public Health and the COVID-19 Response

This blog is a summary of our recent paper in the Journal of the American Association. The public health response to COVID-19 requires a mix of general and targeted public health interventions, i.e., precision public health. Precision public health uses data from traditional and emerging sources to target interventions for populations by person, place, and Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentPredictive Analytics, Implementation Science, Precision Medicine and Precision Public Health

This blog is a summary of our recent paper based on a multidisciplinary workshop convened by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to explore enhancement of predictive analytics for implementation research. The use of predictive analytics in precision medicine (the right intervention to the right patient at the right time) is well established. The Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentFrom Precision Medicine to Precision Public Health: Beyond the Pandemic

Precision medicine and precision public health are emerging fields that use genomics and other big data technologies to provide more targeted interventions at the individual and population levels. Precision medicine can be thought of as delivering the right intervention to the right individual at the right time, while precision public health can be simply viewed Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentAccelerating Precision in Public Health Surveillance and Response
When our communities face a health crisis, the research, clinical, and public health worlds come together and collaborate. Public health programs drive toward prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of the population, but they need the support and guidance of data-driven research behind them every step of the way. While most of the data needed to accelerate Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentUsing Digital Technologies in Precision Public Health: COVID-19 and Beyond

With the global spread of COVID-19, there is a proliferation of scientific information and publications that use novel approaches such as genomics and precision health tools (e.g., big data, wearables, and digital devices) in surveillance and epidemiologic investigations. Could these new technologies provide added value to traditional approaches? In the past, we have written about Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentManipulating the Human Microbiome for Precision Public Health: Prospects and Challenges

Spotlight on the Human Microbiome The human microbiome has a crucial role in driving public health science and initiatives towards more “precision”. In a recent viewpoint and podcast, Harkins, et al. discuss the potential and current applications for manipulating the human microbiome for disease prevention and management. The authors describe several examples of microbiome manipulation Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentIn the Era of Public Health Emergencies, Interoperability Rules are a Beacon for More Precision in Public Health

In the current wake of COVID-19, it is evident that the public health ecosystem needs to modernize how we gather, make sense of, and disseminate data from multiple sources. The health threats we face today spread wider and change faster than the data flows our traditional approaches were designed to accommodate. Becoming more adept with Read More >
Posted on by Leave a commentProgress in Pathogen Genomics as a Prototype for Precision Public Health

Rapid advances in pathogen genomics have ushered in a new era of “precision public health.” Next-generation sequencing is already enabling more effective investigations of outbreaks of foodborne illnesses, better-targeted tuberculosis control, and more timely and granular influenza surveillance to inform the selection of vaccine strains. In a recent paper in the New England Journal of Read More >
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