Why another conference on personalized medicine?

COST – European Cooperation in Science and Technology – opened up the field of personalized medicine in 1986 when, as part of the Biomedicine and Molecular Biosciences Domain, it sanctioned a research network (aka COST Action) to recruit trial subjects based on differences in metabolic capacity (COST Action B1, 1986). Since then, progress in technology, along with a growing understanding of individual susceptibility to disease and treatment effects, has led to new concepts in translational science such as the Virtual Patient Model. These developments are transforming the way we think about health and disease.