Personalized pain management and anesthesia: preemptive risk identification and therapeutic decision support

A method of determining a risk or a susceptibility to developing obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and/or a risk of OSA patients having increased pain and/or increased anesthetic-, analgesic-, and/or opioid-related adverse effects, the method comprising:

• obtaining a nucleic acid sample from a subject;
• analyzing the sample for the presence or absence of at least one allele of at least one polymorphism associated with pain perception and/or anesthetic-, analgesic, and/or opioid-related adverse effects;
• evaluating the subject for the presence or absence of at least one non-genetic risk factor for suffering adverse effects from administered anesthesia, analgesic, and/or opioid;
• determining the subject's risk of suffering adverse effects from administered anesthesia, analgesic, and/or opioid, wherein the presence of at least one non-genetic risk factor and/or the presence of absence of the at least one allele of the at least one polymorphism indicates that the patient has an elevated risk for susceptibility to developing OSA and/or a risk of OSA patients having increased pain and/or increased anesthetic-, analgesic-, and/or opioid-related adverse effects.

A method of carrying out personalized treatment to maximize pain relief while minimizing adverse effects in a subject, the method comprising:

• identifying a subject in need of pain relief;
• obtaining a nucleic acid sample from the subject;
• analyzing the sample for the presence or absence of at least one allele of at least one polymorphism associated with pain perception, persistent postoperative/chronic pain, and/or anesthetic-, analgesic, and/or opioid-related adverse effects;
• evaluating the subject for the presence or absence of at least one non-genetic risk factor for suffering adverse effects from administered anesthesia, analgesic, and/or opioid;
• determining the subject's risk of suffering adverse effects from administered anesthesia, analgesic, or opioid, wherein the presence of at least one non-genetic risk factor and/or the presence of absence of the at least one allele of the at least one polymorphism indicates that the patient has an elevated risk for suffering an adverse anesthesia-, analgesic-, and/or opioid-related effect;
• selecting one or more preferred therapeutics and/or alternatives and preferred dosage ranges based upon the determination;
• avoiding high-risk therapeutics based upon the determination;
• administering to the subject the one or more preferred therapeutics in the preferred dosage ranges, wherein administration of the one or more preferred therapeutics results in personalized treatment by maximizing pain relief while minimizing adverse effects.