Psychosis is more than mere biology

BOSTON, Feb. 18 (UPI) -- Personalized medicine -- treatment individualized genetically -- will need to focus on the person --not just genes, a U.S. bioethicist said.

In a speech at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Boston, Jason Robert of Arizona State University said that while understanding biology is crucial to the understanding of psychosis, "there is more to psychosis than mere biology."

Robert said claims that genetics and neuroscience will revolutionize medicine and elaborate predictions about new diagnostic tools and new treatments are not being borne out "because they fail to grapple with the complexity of human beings -- as brains, bodies, and, embedded in culture, steeped in history, and dynamically creating their own worlds. If we're really going to have personalized medicine, we have to be focusing not just on the genome, but the person."

Rather that having a caricature of culture in mind, "what's really critically important is understanding cultures dynamically, as complex, historic, social and political structures that dramatically influence people's lives."

Ignoring all except biology may mean never having the capacity "to actually influence the well-being of the patient," he said.