The advancement of pharmacogenetics and personalized medicine provides promise for more effective treatments across populations, but it is essential to discuss the care that should be taken for integrating pharmacogenetics into clinical practice. There is considerable controversy on the use of race in research and how to best translate results from studies that have used racial categories66, 67. There is the possibility of misusing terms associated with race and/or genetic variation that can result in negative social consequences66, 67. Interviews with clinicians suggest that individually tailored treatment based on pharmacogenetics information is still in its infancy and that currently, racial identity is used to represent someone’s genetic ancestry68. Thus, continued discussions on the ethics of pharmacogenetics research need to be encouraged to best inform the use of genetic ancestry information in clinical practice.
