An alarming 6.5 per cent of hospital admissions
are due to adverse drug reactions. Now a unique drug monitoring
service is helping to ensure that drugs prescribed to treat
life-threatening diseases don't themselves make patients ill due to
serious side effects. The pharmacogenetics service is based in the
Purine Research Laboratory, part of GSTS Pathology LLP - the UK's
leading supplier of pathology services provided jointly by Guy's
and St Thomas' and King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trusts
and Serco plc.
Variation in drug response is often due to specific differences
in the genetic make-up between individuals. By studying genes
involved in drug metabolism, the pharmacogenetic researchers can
identify markers predicting serious side effects to therapy.
Therapy can then be changed in these patients, avoiding hospital
stays and treatment failure.
Investment by the Charity in the new service has led to tests
for genetic markers to help optimise commonly used drug therapies
in cancer and autoimmune conditions. A grant from the Charity of
£190,000 has enabled Dr Jeremy Sanderson (Consultant
Gastroenterologist) and Dr Marinaki's team in the Purine Research
Laboratory to develop a national service to optimise azathioprine
therapy for inflammatory bowel disease. With these tests guiding
new treatment strategies, azathioprine therapy can now be
personalised to unprecedented levels, thereby preventing patients
from requiring surgery or more toxic therapies. Working with
Dr Paul Ross in Medical Oncology, the team have identified
pharmacogenetic markers predicting serious toxicity to the
fluoropyrimidine drugs capecitabine and 5-fluorouracil. These
markers have been brought into the diagnostic service by GSTS
Pathology and will directly benefit patients at Guy's and St
Thomas' and King's College Hospital and the more than 100,000
patients treated with these drugs each year across the NHS.
In addition to its general funding, the Charity has recognised
the positive impact that pharmacogenetics will have on patient care
and has awarded £561,000 to fund research to find genetic markers
predicting serious side effects to drugs used for the treatment of
lung cancer and for preventing rejection in renal transplantation.
This research will benefit patients directly. In addition,
pharmacogenetic markers have commercial value as diagnostic tests
and the use of these diagnostic tests will provide a return on
investment for the Charity - for new investment into future health
service innovations.
"Being able to identify the genetic markers which lead to
an adverse reaction can make a massive difference to patients, as
well as presenting a cost saving to the NHS in avoidable
hospitalisation", said Dr Tony Marinaki, Clinical Biochemist.