If you've been looking for an opportunity to do something positive for yourself and our community here it is, The All of Us Research Program!
Do you ever get frustrated when a treatment the doctor prescribed isn't working? Think about it, you probably have a sickness that tons of people currently have, but you're all being treated the same way. If our bodies work differently because we're all unique, why are we still giving every person the same medicine or treatment plan?
The All of Us Research Program has a simple mission to address this. The program, done in conjunction with NIH, seeks to speed up health research breakthroughs. To do this, they are asking one million people to share health information. In the future, researchers can use this to conduct thousands of health studies.This means the future of health begins with YOU!
People of all kinds are invited to join! No health insurance is required, and it doesn't matter if you're healthy or have a long-term health issue. Only caveat is you have to be 18 or older.
I talked with Dr. Jeffrey Whittle from the Medical College of Wisconsin; you may be hearing pieces of this conversation on 95.7 BIG FM. As we discuss, All of Us aims to reach a diverse audience to provide better treatments on a case by case basis for individuals - aka "precision medicine."
As Dr. Whittle notes, the biggest innovation with this initiative is to combined biological data with environment and lifestyle considerations. This helps scientists, researchers, doctors, and all who work in medicine and healthcare better understand how behavior and biology work together. Consequently, doctors will better be able to identify risk factors for certain diseases and offer better treatments.
Hopefully, the All of Us program will result in better tests to see if people are sick or at risk of getting sick, better mobile apps to encourage healthy habits and better medicine or information regarding how much and what type of medication is best for each person!
Click HERE to learn more about how you can be one in a million and join All of Us!