Pharmacogenomics: implications for laboratory medicine

Pharmacogenomics deals with the interactions of individual genetic constitution with drug therapy. It has potentially far reaching consequences for drug development and future treatment strategies, but also for clinical in vitro diagnostics. With increasing knowledge about interactions between genes and drug treatment, there will be an equally increasing demand for rapid and reliable diagnostic tests prior to the institution of therapy. In fact. it is very likely that pharmacogenetic tests will make up a significant proportion of total molecular biology testing in the coming years. Therefore, this review focuses on the implications of pharmacogenomics on the clinical laboratory. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.