Approaching One-Year Anniversary at FDA, Stephen Spielberg Highlights Agency’s Progress in Personalized Medicine

In his address to the Personalized Medicine Coalition (PMC) Policy Committee at our most recent meeting, Stephen Spielberg, M.D., Ph.D., Deputy Commissioner for Medical Products and Tobacco at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), announced that the Agency will develop a catalog of personalized medicine-related activities. The catalog, as Dr. Spielberg described, will provide a full accounting of the activities at the agency, including all regulatory divisions and regulatory science.

While reflecting on his 11-month tenure at the agency, Dr. Spielberg also noted that the largest area for advancing personalized medicine was through communication among stakeholders and FDA Centers.  He noted that “PMC is so important because we need dialogue; no one has a lock on complete information.”

The attendees of the policy meeting were pleased to hear that already, less than a year into Dr. Spielberg’s appointment at the agency, he was working to encourage collaboration and communication across divisions.  Dr. Spielberg was previously Director of the Center for Personalized Medicine and Therapeutic Innovation at Children’s Mercy Hospital, one of the founding members of the PMC and so has experience in bringing groups together to advance personalized medicine.

Dr. Spielberg outlined his optimism for personalized medicine at the FDA, noting that one third of the new drug approvals currently in review are for targeted or orphan indications.  He said that by year’s end, we could expect guidance documents on companion diagnostics and co-development, as well as the previously mentioned catalog.

These guidance documents and a FDA catalog may prove to be additional stepping stones to a broader understanding of the impact of personalized medicine on scientific research and clinical medicine.  At PMC, we will continue to work with FDA to promote broader engagement across the ecosystem of stakeholders and greater transparency around research and drug development.  We look forward to the issuance of these materials later this year and will engage a public discourse about them.

Tags: FDA, personalized medicine, PMC, Stephen Spielberg