At the United States Capitol on December 5, the co-chairs of the Congressional Personalized Medicine Caucus organized a briefing in cooperation with the Personalized Medicine Coalition to help educate their colleagues in the House and Senate about the importance of adopting public policies designed to alleviate educational, reimbursement, and clinical adoption challenges that make it difficult for clinicians to take full advantage of emerging opportunities in personalized medicine.

Recognizing that genetic and molecularly informed diagnostic approaches could point to improved therapeutic options for certain patients with rapidly progressing cancers, rare genetic diseases, and autoimmune conditions, the briefing explored how Congress could help speed potentially life-saving diagnoses to American patients by providing for government-sponsored studies and pilot programs to assess the clinical and economic potential of genetic and genomic testing for diagnosing rare diseases; by providing for educational programs for physicians and patients about opportunities to use pharmacogenetic testing to predict and prevent adverse drug reactions in patients with certain genetic characteristics; and by establishing a benefit category for Medicare coverage of multi-cancer early detection tests upon U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval.