A First Dilemma in Cardiovascular Medicine

Adherence to therapy refers to “the extent to

which patients follow a general strategy of

medical instructions, this implying an active

patient participation about the timing, dosage, and

frequency of taking medications, as well as about

compliance with health-related behavior or lifestyle

modification” (1). Thus, current practice is to advise

the same pharmacological therapy or lifestyle modification

to a wide range of patients who are all presumed

to resemble one another in terms of disease

entity or of risk factor lifestyle category. Conversely,

personalized or individualized therapy is the art and

science of “coupling established clinical–pathological

indices with state-of-the-art molecular profiling, to

create diagnostic and therapeutic strategies precisely

tailored to each patient’s requirements”     llegir més