What did we learn, what are we going to do? Wrap-up



Friday, 16. September 2011 | 11:15 Uhr

Speaker

Gerd Folkers

Organisation

Collegium Helveticum

Reporting

All structural and organizational spheres have to be considered in personalized medicine. Genotypes only indicate the potential of a disease. But all the other factors need to be taken into account as well. The traditional approach to medicine often starts on a molecular level. In contrast to this, there is the opinion of the patient who does not always agree with medicine. The speakers gave many examples of useful applications of personalized medicine.

Professor Gerd Folkers, Collegium Helveticum, questioned the principles of truth standards and no harm outlined by Dr. Vayena. With the introduction of new concepts, big challenges in the field of cultural differences and doctor-patient relationships have to be faced. What has to be done? There is the gigantic task of converging data bases and methods in order to have one reliable method at the end. Constant discussion on this issue is necessary. For this purpose, stakeholders have to be indentified and integrated.

Gerd Folkers

He has been Full Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at ETH Zurich since 1994 and Associate Professor since 1991. He took the Chair of the Collegium Helveticum on the first of October 2004.

Born in Andernach/Rhein (Germany) in 1953, Folkers studied Pharmacy at the University of Bonn where he earned his doctorate subsequently. With his doctoral advisor he relocated to the University of Tübingen in 1983 and completed his habilitation there in 1989. During a stay with H.-D. Höltje in Berne in 1984/85, he studied new research methods in computer-aided molecular design. He expanded his knowledge during other stays abroad, especially at the Birkbeck College in London and at the Texas A&M University in College Station.

His research focus lies on the molecular interaction between drugs and its binding sites in vivo. Folkers is particularly interested in the strong integration of computer-aided modelling and relevant biochemical/biophysical experiments. Besides the research on molecular mechanism of «conventional» nucleoside therapeutics against virus infection and cancer, his special interest has shifted to immuno therapeutics.

He is editor of the journals «QSAR» and «Pharmaceutica Acta Helvetiae», author and editor of diverse scientific books, Vice President of the «Schweizerische Gesellschaft der Pharmazeutischen Wissenschaften», member of the executive board of the «Schweizerische Akademie der Technischen Wissenschaften» as well as a member of the board of many international scientific societies.

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