asthma

Genetic ancestry can tell more about a person's potential lung function than the self-identified racial profile commonly used to determine normal lung function reference standards, according to the results of research led by UCSF and Northwestern University.

Asthma specialist and genetics researcher, Esteban G. Burchard, MD, MPH, joint faculty member in the UCSF Schools of Pharmacy and Medicine, discusses the differences in the incidence of asthma and response to asthma drugs among various subgroups within the larger Latino population.

Burchard participates in a panel and explains the differences between race and ethnicity and more with NPR’s Science Friday aired January 15, 2010.

What began as a fascination with fish when he was a child eventually led Esteban Burchard, MD to study genetic differences behind asthma risk.

While tailoring medications to a group's genetic ancestry can be important, scientists warn that these generalizations might also be misleading. UCSF School of Pharmacy faculty member and pharmacogenetics and asthma researcher Esteban Burchard, MD, comments at the Genomics, Race, and Health...