Personalized respiratory medicine: Exploring the horizon, addressing the issues

Abstract

This Pulmonary Perspective summarizes the content and main conclusions of an international workshop on personalized respiratory medicine co-organized by the Barcelona Respiratory Network (www.brn.cat) and the AJRCCM in June 2014. It discusses: (1) its definition, historical, social, legal and ethical aspects; (2) the view from different disciplines, including basic science, epidemiology, bioinformatics and network/systems medicine.; (3) the bottlenecks and opportunities identified by some currently ongoing projects; and, (4) the implications for the individual, the health-care system and the pharmaceutical industry. Authors hope that, albeit not a systematic review on the subject, this document can be a useful reference for researchers, clinicians, health-care managers, policy-makers, and industry parties interested in personalized respiratory medicine.