TY - JOUR

T1 - Precision medicine in primary care

T2 - How GPs envision “old” and “new” forms of personalization

AU - Pot, Mirjam

AU - Spalletta, Olivia

AU - Green, Sara

PY - 2024

Y1 - 2024

N2 - Visions of precision or personalized medicine (PM) are gaining currency around the globe. While the potential of PM in specialist medicine has been in focus, primary care is also considered to be a fruitful area for the application of PM. “Low-tech” forms of personalization and attention to individual patients are already central features of primary care practice, and primary care thus constitutes an area in which “old” and “new” forms of personalization (may) come together. Against this backdrop, we explore general practitioners’ (GPs) views on PM and how they envision the future of personalization in primary care. We draw on 45 qualitative interviews with GPs from Austria, Denmark, and the United States. Along the lines of major “promises” of PM—tailoring treatment decisions, improving disease prevention, empowering patients—we show that in some areas GPs consider PM to be a continuation or extension of existing practices of personalization, while in other cases, GPs envision that PM may negatively disrupt current forms of personalization in primary care. We suggest that this ambivalent stance towards PM can be understood through the lens of GPs’ views on core values and practices of primary care.

AB - Visions of precision or personalized medicine (PM) are gaining currency around the globe. While the potential of PM in specialist medicine has been in focus, primary care is also considered to be a fruitful area for the application of PM. “Low-tech” forms of personalization and attention to individual patients are already central features of primary care practice, and primary care thus constitutes an area in which “old” and “new” forms of personalization (may) come together. Against this backdrop, we explore general practitioners’ (GPs) views on PM and how they envision the future of personalization in primary care. We draw on 45 qualitative interviews with GPs from Austria, Denmark, and the United States. Along the lines of major “promises” of PM—tailoring treatment decisions, improving disease prevention, empowering patients—we show that in some areas GPs consider PM to be a continuation or extension of existing practices of personalization, while in other cases, GPs envision that PM may negatively disrupt current forms of personalization in primary care. We suggest that this ambivalent stance towards PM can be understood through the lens of GPs’ views on core values and practices of primary care.

U2 - 10.1016/j.socscimed.2024.117259

DO - 10.1016/j.socscimed.2024.117259

M3 - Journal article

VL - 358

JO - Social Science & Medicine

JF - Social Science & Medicine

SN - 0277-9536

ER -