U.S. Acts To Foster Genetic-Linked Drugs

Hoping to spur a movement toward "personalized medicine," U.S. regulators issued guidelines on Tuesday that urge companies to submit data on how genetic differences affect the way people respond to drugs. The research by the Food and Drug Administration is intended to help identify which patients will benefit from a specific drug, and which are more prone to side effects. The field of science, called pharmacogenomics, is still in its early stages, and drug companies have been concerned about how regulators might use preliminary information. The new guidelines aim to clarify FDA policy for the industry, an FDA statement said. They outline the type of information regulators want to see from clinical trials of new medicines.