College of Psychiatric and Neurologic Pharmacists

At the intersection of pharmacology and genetics is pharmacogenetics or pharmacogenomics. This rapidly evolving field is one of the cornerstones of Personalized Medicine, however many health care providers do not feel comfortable with the science behind this field nor with the ambiguity in the data that is currently available to support mainstream integration of this field into practice. Thus, the goal of this presentation is to briefly review some of the genetic principals that underlie the field of pharmacogenomics so that health care providers may feel more comfortable in reviewing this literature and be able to understand how to incorporate this science into their practice.

During this session we will review some of the literature regarding the pharmacogenetics of psychiatry and discuss why the literature may be reporting conflicting information. We will also discuss an example of how this science may be clinically used and outline some of the barriers we currently face in incorporation of these data into everyday clinical practice. At the very beginning of the Human Genome Project, pharmacogenetics was outlined as a priority. Although Personalized Medicine using pharmacogenetics has become a reality, or soon will be a reality for many other therapeutic areas, this promise has not yet been realized in the mental health arena. Lastly, we will discuss the role of the Food and Drug Administration on pharmacogenetics as it relates to the drug approval process and package insert information, and discuss some of the direct to consumer laboratories that are currently available for testing and what this might mean to the practice of neuropsychiatric pharmacy.

1. Acquire a basic understanding of genetic principles applicable to the study of pharmacogenomics.
2. Discuss results of recent pharmacogenomics studies and application to clinical practice.
3. Recognize the barriers in the process of translating data from pharamcogenomic studies to clinical practice.
4. Identify issues surrounding direct to consumer pharmacogenomic testing and the role of the FDA.

Activity Dates: 04/22/2009 - 04/22/2012
ACPE Contact Hours: 1.0
ACPE Number: 0284-0000-09-013-H01-P
Nursing Credit Reminder: Note that ACPE and ACCME credit is accepted for certification renewal.

This course is provided online at cpnp.org and consists of the speaker audio and slides. A PDF file of the slides is also provided and access is available to participants indefinitely although ACPE credit is available only through the course expiration date.

Participants in this course must complete an examination and achieve a score of 60% or greater. Successful completion of the course also requires the completion of a course evaluation. ACPE statements of credit can be retrieved by participants online at cpnp.org immediately upon successful completion of the course.

If you are a pharmacist, nurse practitioner or other healthcare professional involved in the medication therapy management of psychiatric and/or neurological patients, we invite you to participate in this online course.

This programming was supported in part by grants from Bristol-Myers Squibb, Forest Laboratories, Inc., Lilly, Schering-Plough, Cyberonics, and Shire.