• Prediction
• Prevention
• Personalized
• Participatory

In the presentation, he demonstrated studies (in mice) of looking at the complete process of illness: genotype, phenotype including biological networks and molecular machines.  He is even examining the organ specific blood footprints and miRNA as markers of disease progression.

He predicts that in the future there will be a virtual cloud of data points for each person, billions of data points for billions of people, and that healthcare IT must prepare to address this.

The real core of something like P4 is prediction. The complexity of achieving this level of analysis for many diseases is a challenge. One audience member questioned why the promise of P4 medicine is more likely to provide cures that the promise of decoding the human genome which came with such promise a decade ago. It is difficult to find a good critique of P4 Medicine to balance the pure optimism of Dr. Hood.  At any rate, P4 Medicine and Personalized Medicine are trends to watch with tempered optimism.

Below are slides from a presentation by Leroy Hood at Ohio State University where he will speak in October.