Phenomix Sciences Launches Obesity Biobanking Registry Studying Personalized Treatment Options Based on Genetics

What You Should Know:

– Biotech company Phenomix Sciences launches its biobanking registry, marking the first obesity registry to study the impact of personalized treatment based on phenotyping. The impact of this biobanking registry and the data it will yield has the potential to change the entire system’s approach to obesity, from a treatment recommendation to the way payers determine coverage and how the industry combines diagnostics testing with drug therapy.

– The data collected will supplement the 20 billion unique data points that make up the Phenomix Sciences Obesity Platform. Mayo Clinic is the first to enroll in the registry with its Rochester site set to contribute patient outcomes from 2,000 patients undergoing treatment for obesity to its biobank.   

Understanding Phenotyping

Phenotyping is a new method for treating obesity and Phenomix, a biotech company, is the first to bring this technology to market with proven results. The announcement of the company’s biobank is the next step to gathering real patient data to better understand phenotypes by looking at patients’ DNA, metabolomics, hormones, patient behavior, assessments, and treatment outcomes. A growing body of evidence indicates that obesity is not a single disease with a single treatment type, but a constellation of diseases.

Obesity’s roots lie in individual DNA; however, evidence suggests there is a complicated web connecting obesity to age, race, and gender, education, and socioeconomic status. Understanding a person’s obesity phenotype — the combination of genes with environmental and behavioral factors — can help pinpoint the cause of weight gain. Phenomix’s phenotypes are based on research from its physician founders, Andres Acosta, MD, Ph.D. and Michael Camilleri, MD of Mayo Clinic, that has demonstrated when patients have been phenotyped and prescribed the right medications, they can achieve up to 16 percent total body weight loss (TBWL).