Abstract:
Pharmacogenetics (PGx) aims to elucidate genes that affect individual drug response and thus facilitate a personalized drug therapy for patients. The first aim of this work was to explore the potential impact of PGx at the hospital Robert-Bosch-Krankenhaus (RBK) by analyzing prescription data from three years (2018 – 2020). During 81 % of inpatient stays at least one PGx drug was prescribed. Our analysis showed an increasing impact of PGx diagnostics with increasing age but no gender-specific differences. Furthermore, it showed that a PGx diagnostic would be beneficial for all investigated departments (internal medicine, surgery, hematology and oncology, geriatrics and emergency department). In an estimation based on publicly available information of allele frequencies in the European population, a PGx drug was administered to a patient with a corresponding actionable phenotype in 21 % of cases (actionable drug-gene pairs). Based on these findings, a majority of patients at the RBK could benefit from PGx. Hence, within a prospective study, we implemented a panel-based pharmacogenetic diagnostic at the RBK. For this thesis, 255 study patients were included. In accordance with prior studies, 95 % of patients had at least one genetic variant in the tested pharmacogenes (CYP2B6, CYP2C9, CYP2C19, CYP2D6, CYP3A5, DPYD, F5, SLCO1B1, TPMT, UGT1A1, VKORC1) that resulted in a drug or dosing recommendation. 21 % of these patients had a PGx recommendation for their current medication. In 37 % of these cases, the medication was changed at the RBK due to the pharmacogenetic report. Within a follow-up period, patients and their general practitioners received questionnaires regarding the acceptance of the PGx reports and their perception. 33 % of patients activated their personal password-protected online account containing the PGx results. The questionnaires indicate that 77 % of general practitioners would use PGx information for future prescriptions. Although 65 % of general practitioners state a need for further PGx training. In summary, we successfully implemented PGx testing in an academic teaching hospital in Germany. Additionally, at two wards, the hematologic intermediate care unit and the geriatric ward of the RBK, the pharmacist participated at rounds. Pharmaceutical interventions were proposed for 20 % to 32 % of patients. The acceptance (95 %) and implementation rates (82 % - 88 %) of the proposed interventions were very high at both wards. In 17 % of pharmaceutical interventions at the hematological intermediate care unit available PGx information was taken into consideration. This additional analysis showed the potential of implementing ward-based pharmacists to improve drug safety.