Towards personalised medicine for all EU citizens
PM is an innovative method to treat patients that uses research, data and cutting-edge technology in providing better diagnostics and follow-up. It facilitates more personalised health interventions for citizens and offers tailored therapies and treatments for patients. Fragmented activities among Member States, inadequate communication and lack of a common vision stand in the way of citizens, public health systems and the economy fully benefitting from PM. To address these issues, the EU-funded PERMED (Personalised medicine 2020 and beyond – Preparing Europe for leading the global way (PerMed)) project aimed to increase coordination efforts between key European stakeholders, create synergies to avoid duplication or competition and deliver recommendations. Project partners identified best practices and key players in PM across Europe, and assessed gaps, needs and existing barriers. This was accomplished through literature reviews, surveys and interviews. They then prepared recommendations to better integrate PM into European and national research strategies. The PERMED team created a web-based platform to reinforce cross-border networking. To this end, two workshops brought together key players and stakeholders in various PM areas in Europe and beyond. Furthermore three articles were published were the PerMed activities and results have been incorporated. A Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA) was developed to guide European decision-makers. It identifies five main challenges to implementing PM: developing awareness and empowerment; integrating big data and ICT solutions; translating basic research to clinical research and beyond; bringing innovation to the market; and shaping sustainable healthcare. SRIA also provides 35 recommendations to tackle these main challenges and proposes 22 key PM research priorities. PERMED provided a crucial first step towards overcoming limitations in the adoption of PM by healthcare systems in Europe.
Keywords
Personalised medicine, personalised health interventions, PERMED
