Chapter 9 - Raising Genomics Awareness Among the General Public and Educating Healthcare Professionals on Genomic Medicine

Abstract

Advances in genomics research are yet to make their way into the clinic, one of the most significant barriers being the lack of genomics education among health care professionals and biomedical scientists as well as the low genomic literacy of patients and the general public. This phenomenon is more profound in developing countries and low-resource environments. This chapter summarizes the educational and outreaching activities of the Golden Helix Foundation, by which recent knowledge and developments in the field of genomic and precision medicine are brought to participants from developing countries who often face financial and logistic constrains that prevent attendance at similar conferences in the United States and Western Europe. Also, these conferences provide the opportunity to establish partnerships and collaborations among senior scientists, while junior delegates can also benefit by interacting with the speakers, which may create short- and long-term training opportunities. Since 2008, there have been more than 35 Golden Helix conferences that have been organized in various locations worldwide, which could be used as a paradigm of a well-orchestrated effort to enrich genomics education among health care professionals and to increase genomic literacy among patients and the general public, specifically addressing the needs of participants from developing countries.