US HHS issues report on personalized health care

A study by the US Department of Health and Human Services has been touted as its first department-wide report on the goal of personalized health care. Michael Leavitt, the HHS Secretary, said the publication, titled: Personalized Health Care: Opportunities, Pathways, Resources, is a long-range vision for focusing treatments on individual patients.

Mr Leavitt stressed the importance of genetic research and health information technology. In a foreword to the report, he wrote that "health care professionals have always aimed at making medical care as individualized as possible. But in truth, our ability to deliver the right care for each person has been limited."

The HHS report outlines opportunities presented by science and technology, including pharmaceuticals. It also presents what the federal department declares is the first inventory of about 50 programs relating to personalized medicine across the HHS' several agencies, which include the Centers for Disease Conrol and Prevention (CDC), the National Cancer Institute and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.