QuintilesIMS report discusses pharmacists’ roles regarding precision medicines
STOCKHOLM — A new report from the QuintilesIMS Institute outlines a number of challenges that health systems need to overcome in order to maximise the benefits that precision medicines offer to patients.
The report also describes the roles of different stakeholders within the health system, including pharmacists. “Pharmacists need to understand what’s happening around them regarding the availability of precision medicines and their profiles. The pharmacology of precision medicines is complex. Pharmacists have an important role to play in understanding these medicines, interpreting diagnostic results and ensuring that the requisite testing has been and is being done so that the right patients are treated,” Murray Aitken, executive director of the Quintiles IMS Institute and co-author of the report, said Tuesday during the International Pharmaceutical Federation 6th Pharmaceutical Sciences World Congress, taking place in Stockholm.
Precision medicines are defined as treatments tailored to groups of patients based on predictive biomarkers (which indicate who is likely to benefit from the drug) or to individuals based on their unique genetic profile or status, such as age and gender. “There are around 80 precision medicines currently on the market, over half in the field of cancer treatment, but in the past five years we’ve seen a surge in new precision medicines — and spending on them — and there are more in the pipeline,” said Aitken.
He pointed out that since 45% of these medicines are coming to market with “black box warnings” indicating evidence of an association with serious hazard, pharmacist engagement with patients is also important: “Pharmacists can enroll patients on pharmacovigilance programs. And when serious side effects are possible, the relationship that patients have with the pharmacist can help those side effects be more quickly identified. It’s critical for pharmacists to step up and play the fullest role they can.”
The report, “Upholding the clinical promise of precision medicine: Current position and outlook,” also highlights clinical decision-making, shortcomings in health system diagnostics, patient privacy issues, global availability, gathering big data and cost as among the challenges faced. “There’s no question that the science is advancing rapidly. The question is whether the health care system is advancing fast enough to ensure patients will benefit from these medicines. Precision medicines have unique traits that the current health care framework does not adequately support,” said Aitken.
The report concludes with a set of recommendations for the future applications of precision medicines, including continued uptake of multi-panel diagnostic testing and the sharing of health care data. “These recommendations are not going to solve all the problems but they’re a pragmatic way forward. Precision medicines can add significant value for patients and health systems by offering improvements in response rate and tolerability, dosing guidelines, potential drug-drug interactions, and effective management of complex diseases,” said Aitken.