The falling cost of genetic screening, with its ability to uncover individual genetic information, has led to a rise in interest in personalized medicine.
Traditional medicine, as it is practiced today, relies on a one-size-fits-all approach.
Typically, only half of the people receiving a particular medication actually benefit from it.
The idea behind personalized medicine is that, by knowing more about your genetic background, you will be able to receive treatment that benefits someone with your individual characteristics, yielding a higher quality outcome and avoiding unnecessary medicine and side effects.
One of the problems, however, lies in getting access to a large enough pool of personal, genetic data in order to be able to determine optimal treatment.
Specifically, people are reluctant to share their genetic information for fear that insurance companies will use the information to raise premiums or, worse yet, refuse coverage.
In order to have any real value, however, scientists need a large pool of genetic information in order to determine optimal treatment (i.e. the value of the community increases with the amount of data).
How do you aggregate individual genetic information, enabling researchers to draw necessary conclusions, while preserving anonymity?
Think Wesabe.
Wesabe is a money management tool/community/site that anonymously aggregates user's financial data, then harnesses the users' data to generate money saving tips and recommendations.
Perhaps people can do with their personal genetic information, what they do with their personal financial data?
Specifically, in order to unlock the power of personalized medicine, someone should create a Wesabe-type site which anonymously aggregates and analyzes personal genetic information, then automatically generates tips and recommendations that will benefit all of the site's users.
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