Amsterdam Public Health

Program support: Bryn Hummel
Contact: aph.personalizedmedicine@amsterdamumc.nl

We aim to increase attention to the cultural, ethnic, socio-economic, gender, genetic and psychological diversity in the population

Mission and goals

The Personalized Medicine research program aims to increase attention to the cultural, ethnic, socio-economic, gender, genetic and psychological diversity in the population and to people’s social identities.

With the combination of ongoing (bio-)technological developments and the perceived need for person-centered decision-making, medicine has now arrived in an era where more customization is both needed and possible. Personal genomes, information on subtypes of diseases, and individual characteristics and preferences can guide stratification and personalization in healthcare.

In the future we can fine-tune the healthcare system, especially in primary care and public health, offering stratified approaches wherever possible, and personalizing where needed, while normative (ethical and legal) aspects will be addressed.

Program leaders

Research themes

Mapping Diversity in Healthcare Needs

We will study diversity in (future) healthcare clients, at different levels (personal, interpersonal, institutional, and societal) and in different settings, and analyze the relevance for health, prevention, and healthcare.

Risk Profiling

We will study risk profiling, classifying and stratifying patients and other clients, to predict benefit or harm from diagnostics and interventions (including pharmacogenomics and population screening programs).

Stratified Interventions

With research partners within the Amsterdam academic alliance, we will systematically develop, implement, and evaluate guidelines and interventions that build on and effectively respond to biological and social axes of diversity, including genetic factors and intersectionality.

Training for Diversity

We will contribute to how future healthcare professionals can be better trained to be receptive and effective to differences in patient diversity, presentation, needs, and goals, for example by improving care providers’ skills in Shared Decision Making.

Special Interest Groups

In 2022 the Personalized medicine program has started with Special Interest Groups, aiming to stimulate collaboration on three specific topics: Patient centered care, Innovation and impact in personalized medicine and Diversity in health & care research.

Patient centered care

From the patient's perspective we aim to connect researchers who are concerned with the development and implementation of measures, care models and research methodologies tailored towards the individual patient (patient reported outcomes, shared decision making).

Innovation and impact in personalized medicine

To achieve true impact with innovations in Personalized Medicine, timely research is needed to ensure their effectiveness and acceptability. This includes valorization of prediction models and other tools for precision medicine, the study of ethical values, legal frameworks and analyzing the potential consequences for existing paradigms in (public health) care.

Within the Personalized Medicine research program we stimulate the interdisciplinary study of the impact of new technologies and other developments, including ethical, legal and social issues, in order to set the right frameworks for responsible innovation and to ultimately optimize impact.

Diversity in health & care research

The SIG ‘diversity in health & care research’ aims to connect researchers working on inclusive research and to make knowledge on inclusivity and diversity in research available for the APH community. We will do so by developing a chapter for the APH Quality Handbook with guidelines for inclusive research (both qualitative and quantitative methods), and by providing an overview on emerging Toolkits on the subject (such as e-learnings).

This SIG aims to collaborate across programs, for instance by working together with QoC’s SIG: “Creating awareness for boundaries related to vulnerable people” and the ‘inclusive research initiative’ within the Amsterdam Prevention Network.

Senior program council

The program leaders of the Personalized medicine research program chair the PM Senior program council. This senior program council consist of a selection of senior researchers of the research program who meet regularly to implement or update the research program-specific strategy and to discuss anticipatory or reactive response to external events.

Junior program council

The Personalized Medicine research program has installed a PM Junior program council that provides program leaders with solicited and unsolicited advice and helps them with the organization of research program-specific activities or events.

Research program members