Introducing the microbiome into Precision Medicine

Abstract

Understanding how individual people respond to medical therapy is a key facet of improving the odds ratio that interventions will have a positive impact. Reducing the non-responder rate for an intervention or reducing complications associated with a particular treatment or surgery is the next stage of medical advance. The Precision Medicine Initiative, launched in January 2015, set the stage for enhanced collaboration between researchers and medical professionals to develop next-generation techniques to aid patient treatment and recovery, and increased the opportunities for impactful pre-emptive care. The microbiome plays a crucial role in health and disease, as it influences endocrinology, physiology, and even neurology, altering the outcome of many different disease states, and it augments drug responses and tolerance. We review the implications of the microbiome on precision health initiatives and highlight excellent examples, whereby precision microbiome health has been implemented.