“All of Us” Research Genome Project: Changing the Future of Health

Dr. Alan Sanders, M.D., will speak on the topic, “All of Us Research Program”: Changing the Future of Health.  Personalized medicine can be defined as the use of individual genetic profiles to guide the practice of medicine.  It is an emerging approach for disease prevention, diagnosis, and treatment that takes into account individual variability in lifestyle, socioeconomics, environment, and biology. It is a radical shift in how each of us can receive the best care possible based on our unique makeup.  The “All of Us Research Program” is a historic, longitudinal effort to gather data from one million or more people living in the United States to accelerate research and improve health.  By taking into account individual differences, we hope that researchers will one day uncover paths toward delivering precision medicine – or individualized prevention, treatment, and care – for all of us. We invite you to visit their website:  https://JoinAllOfUs.org/NS.

Dr. Sanders graduated from Texas A&M University (BS) and received his MD degree from Baylor College of Medicine.  He completed his Residency in Adult Psychiatry at UCLA’s Neuropsychiatric Institute, and his Psychiatry Research Fellowship at the intramural program of the National Institute of Mental Health.  He is currently a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at UChicago, and the Co-director of the Center for Psychiatric Genetics at NorthShore University HealthSystem (NUH).  Dr. Sanders has made contributions to the field of schizophrenia genetics research over the years, including large-scale linkage, association, and transcriptomic studies.  Besides psychiatric genetics (i.e., illnesses such as schizophrenia), he has also focused on behavioral genetics (i.e., behaviors and traits), especially genetics of sexual orientation via family, linkage, and GWAS (Genome-Wide Association Studies), and meta-analyses thereof.