Empowered Patient Podcast

Professor Sir Peter Donnelly, Founder and CEO of Genomics plc, aims to use cutting-edge polygenic risk scores to identify inherited DNA mutations and genetic predispositions that could lead to common diseases. In partnership with the MassMutual life insurance company, Genomics offers a voluntary test that provides personalized risk measures and advice about conversations with clinicians. If the policyholder stays healthy longer, the insurance company will get paid more premiums before paying out to survivors. Win-win all the way around. Peter explains, "Until a few years ago, if I had the entire DNA sequence from a 40-year-old who’s currently healthy, I’d have learned something interesting and medically actionable in maybe 1% or 2% of cases. That’s because genetics has played into medicine through diseases where there’s a single change in our DNA, called a mutation, which often stops a crucial gene from working. Think cystic fibrosis or Huntington’s disease. Those are conditions that are individually serious