Publication
Environmental impacts associated with the manufacturing of personalised medicines: a scoping review
Publisher:
Center for Open Science
Date:
28-01-2023
DOI:
10.31235/OSF.IO/9543P
Abstract: This report presents the findings of a project funded by UCL’s Future Targeted Healthcare Manufacturing Hub. This Hub aims to explore the challenges associated with manufacturing personalised medicines. Personalised medicines aim to move therapies from population-based, “one-size-fits-all” approaches (medicines designed for use by a population) to stratified approaches (medicines targeted to specific sub-populations based on particular (e.g., molecular/genetic) characteristics), and ultimately to approaches whereby therapeutic interventions are tailored to the specific molecular characteristics of one in idual. This move has implications for medicines manufacturing processes. These processes have typically relied on forecasted demand, but as medicines become increasingly targeted to an in idual’s characteristics, manufacturing approaches need to change. For ex le, for therapeutic interventions tailored to one in idual, the manufacturing process has to wait until the in idual’s molecular profile has been determined so that this information can be incorporated into therapeutic production. Other aspects of personalised medicine–such as the use of wearable sensors and 3D printing to customise medication dosages–may also require different approaches to manufacturing. The economic, social, and environmental aspects of any innovation are a necessary component of decision-making about implementation and use. This is the premise of sustainable development. In this report, we aim to better understand how the adverse environmental costs associated with personalised medicines manufacturing are being considered in the academic literature.