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What is Prospective Medicine?
Why is it called P4 Medicine TM ?
Prior to the 20th century, biomedical science could be characterized as symptomatologic medicine, as illnesses were identified and treated based upon external symptoms and disease manifestation.  Discoveries in the 20th century allowed for a better understanding of the underlying causes of many diseases, particularly those driven by external pathogens, such as viruses and bacteria.  Treatments for disease, although based on an understanding of human biology, could be described as reactive medicine, with treatments applied once symptoms had manifested.  Furthermore, therapies were often developed by happenstance (penicillin) or through random application of compounds against a disease.

Prospective Medicine, in which the latest technologies are applied to understand biology and disease, is anticipated to be the medicine of the 21st century.  The focus of this approach to medicine is to gain an understanding of the origins of disease at the genomic level and to translate this knowledge into patient applications. 
Friendster for Proteins
Forbes.com
Robert Langreth and Matthew Herper
03.12.07

Understanding how the body's tiny components communicate is opening up vast territory in drug research.

Peter Sorger spent eight years developing new laboratory gadgets and arcane mathematical theorems to explain how networks of genes and proteins can go awry, causing cancer, arthritis and other diseases. more.....
The growing knowledge of the genome sequence and the technology used to assess gene and protein expression are among the tools the ISM will employ to understand disease from a molecular through the physiological level.

Predictive, Preventive, Personalized & Participatory
(P4 Medicine TM)

Prospective medicine is embodied by Predictive, Preventive, Personalized and Participatory (P4 Medicine TM) medicine. This shift in medicine will allow patients to partner with doctors to become more participatory in the management of their care. New diagnostic and treatment choices that are proactive rather than reactive will be available through a variety of tools already on the near-term horizon. Such tools will allow physicians to analyze an individual's genetic composition and forecast a single patient's health. And, because prevention is less expensive than reactive medicine, a focus on wellness will emerge with the progress of prospective medicine. The ISM ascribes the future of health care to prospective medicine and will play a substantial role in bringing these modalities to the forefront of health care in the United States and throughout the globe.

4 New Ps in Medicine
  1. Predictive Medicine refers to the development of a probabilistic health projection for a person based on their DNA and protein expression.

  2. Preventative Medicine denotes the creation of therapeutics that will prevent a disease that a person is assessed to have a high probability of developing.

  3. Personalized Medicine refers to treating an individual based on their unique human genetic variation, complementing the predictive and preventative efforts above

  4. Participatory Medicine denotes a patient's active, informed involvement in their medical choices and care, acting in partnership with their health providers.

 
 
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