Practice to become personalized

Patients will be able to know what diseases they are prone to, and be able to prevent them rather than having to go through lengthy treatments. This future is nearer than many might think. According to Chung-Chen Liu, vice president of the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and general director of ITRI’s biomedical engineering research laboratory, “eventually the practice of medicine will become personalized.”

“You will know your predisposition to a certain disease,” remarked Liu. While this requires a lot of research and medical devices, it represents a very good opportunity, he added. To this end, ITRI has made great strides in this effort and collaborated with international organizations and companies in areas such as the United States, Japan, China, and Europe.

And while Taiwan invests a relatively small amount towards research compared in monetary terms with other countries like the United States, this figure is still reasonably large proportionally, he observes. “Taiwan is very strong in technology but it is still rather weak in biology,” Liu points out. “So we can make the machine but how to use the machine is still a problem!” he says with a chuckle. Instead, he emphasizes the need for a “multidisciplinary approach” to research.

Liu made the remarks during the 2008 Symposium on Chronic Hepatitis and Liver Diseases, the premier platform in Taiwan for information on advancements in research and therapy of liver diseases, yesterday in Taipei City. “Our mission is to develop the biotech business in Taiwan,” he notes. “Biomedicine is a global business. You need to be able to go out of Taiwan to make your market bigger. What we are doing is developing solutions that are unique enough to stand out.”

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