Precision medicine for age-related macular degeneration: current developments and prospects

Introduction: With the aging population, diseases such as age-related macular degeneration (AMD) will become more prevalent. This will increase the demand for provision of care on affected individuals, society, and the health-care system. To develop the best, individually tailored treatment for every patient, however, remains challenging. 

Areas covered: Recent identifications of interactions between environmental, lifestyle, genetic, and non-genetic factors opened the potential for developing personalized approaches for the prevention and treatment of AMD. In this review, we will discuss the implications of these interactions for early to late disease stage conversion, for neovascularization, and for cell atrophy. We will put the findings of recent studies within the context of the regulatory framework requirements surrounding the development of personalized medicine approach to AMD. 

Expert commentary: Precision medicine is now at a stage that it has its theoretical framework in place for the management of risk for patients with AMD requiring early diagnosis and timely treatment as several key components for such an approach are now clearly identified and are being applied to clinical developments successfully.