title: Ask not what personalized medicine can do for you--ask what you can do for personalized medicine.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Personalized medicine (PM) aims to offer tailored health care to individuals on the basis of their genetic profile. This paper explores the types of behaviors and practices that citizens are expected to adopt under PM, examines whether such expectations are realistic, and proposes strategies that could support citizens in the adoption of these behaviors.
  
  
  METHODS
  Recent reports from national and international medical organizations and funders of PM are reviewed to investigate the types of behaviors and practices that citizens are expected to adopt under PM. These behaviors are examined in light of the current knowledge regarding citizen involvement in health care.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Under PM, citizens are expected to be much more educated, proactive, and engaged in their health care than under conventional medical models. Actualizing such behaviors and practices may, however, be difficult or even unattainable for some groups of citizens.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Educating citizens in PM, as proposed in the reports, is important but may not suffice for the adoption of new behaviors and practices by a majority of citizens. Approaches taking into consideration the heterogeneity of backgrounds, abilities, and resources among citizens are needed and include modifying reimbursement and pricing mechanisms, diversifying research, and developing low-cost PM programs.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Medical Ethics, Institute of Health and Society, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Isabelle
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Budin-Ljøsne
authors.forename: Jennifer R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Harris
mesh_terms: D003256:Community Participation / Q000379:methods / Q000523:psychology; D003258:Consumer Behavior; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000191:economics / Q000379:methods; D023281:Genomics / Q000193:education; D057220:Health Literacy; D006801:Humans; D020380:Needs Assessment; D057285:Precision Medicine / Q000191:economics / Q000941:ethics / Q000379:methods / Q000523:psychology; D012051:Reimbursement Mechanisms; D058028:Research Report