Challenges of translating genetic tests into clinical and public health practice

Here's a good paper published online this morning in Nature Reviews Genetics. As the title suggests, the paper covers many of the challenges associated with translating molecular genetic tests into clinical practice. There are tons of references to articles on the ethical, legal, and social issues surrounding genetic testing in health management. The authors also introduce and give reference to several methods from econometrics (value-of-information analysis, cost-benefit analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, cost-utility analysis, etc) that are frequently used by policy and decision makers to prioritize technology and research funding. However, as the authors point out, although prioritizing funding of technology and research should ideally be based on rigorous evidence-based assessment and appraisal of the existing scientific evidence, this evidence is often not available or would otherwise be prohibitively expensive to collect. The authors conclude with a statement that prioritizing funding for translational genetic research remains just as much of a challenge as the genomic research itself.

Challenges of translating genetic tests into clinical and public health practice (NRG AOP June 9)