Current Drug Metabolism - Volume 15, Issue 2, 2014

The relative role of genetic and environmental factors in the pathogenesis of Parkinson’s disease (PD) has been the matter of investigation and debate, especially in the last 30 years. The possible interaction between genetic and environmental factors led to a great number of association studies between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of many candidate genes and PD risk. In this study we summarized and criticall Read More

Cyclooxygenases (prostaglandin-endoperoxide synthases, (EC 1.14.99.1) 1 and 2 (COX-1 and COX-2)) are key enzymes with a highly functional and pharmacological relevance. Genetic variations in the corresponding genes PTGS1 and PTGS2 are related to diverse human disorders and adverse drug reactions. Although COX-2 is highly inducible, most genetic association studies have focused on coding region gene variants. The ai Read More

Adverse drug reactions involving a range of prescribed drugs and affecting the skin, liver and other organs show strong associations with particular HLA alleles. For some reactions, HLA typing prior to prescription, so that those positive for the risk allele are not given the drug associated with the reaction, shows high positive and negative predictive values. The best example of clinical implementation relates to the hypersensitivity Read More

Pharmacogenetics and Pharmacogenomics areas are currently emerging fields focused to manage pharmacotherapy that may prevent undertreatment while avoiding associated drug toxicity in patients. Large international differences in the awareness and in the use of pharmacogenomic testing are presumed, but not well assessed to date. In the present study we review the awareness of Latin America Read More

The Clinical Pharmacogenetics Implementation Consortium (CPIC) publishes genotype-based drug guidelines to help clinicians understand how available genetic test results could be used to optimize drug therapy. CPIC has focused initially on well-known examples of pharmacogenomic associations that have been implemented in selected clinical settings, publishing nine to date. Each CPIC guideline adheres to a standard Read More

The cytochrome P450 2D6 (CYP2D6) enzyme contributes to the metabolism and/or bioactivation of approximately 25% of clinically used drugs. The CYP2D6 gene locus is highly polymorphic and complex, and variants within this gene locus affect CYP2D6 enzymatic function resulting in a wide range of metabolic activity from little to no activity to ultrarapid metabolism. For many of the drugs metabolized by CYP2D6, the variatio Read More

Numerous studies have analyzed the impact of N-acetyltransferase 2 (NAT2) polymorphisms on drug efficacy, side effects as well as cancer risk. Here, we present the state of the art of deriving haplotypes from polymorphisms and discuss the available software. PHASE v2.1 is currently considered a gold standard for NAT2 haplotype assignment. In vitro studies have shown that some slow acetylation genotypes confer re Read More