• IPIT is a notion that rigorous science can be used to achieve enlightened therapy selection. 

• IPIT is a concept where the disparate expertise required for the transcription of basic research from the bench to the bedside and then the translation from the bedside to the clinic come together for practice.

• IPIT is a desire that the subjective implements of current medication decisions be replaced by objective tools that emphasize the individual patient.

Our Vision is to revolutionize medical practice by creating a new structure to generate and implement new systems for optimal therapy selection for individual patients.  This structure bypasses a traditional project-oriented design, creating a unifying, programmatic structure which encourages and relies on a collaborative and interdisciplinary approach.

Ultimately, by increasing the ability to prospectively identify patients at-risk for severe toxicity, or those likely to benefit from a particular treatment, the field of pharmacogenomics will help us move toward the ultimate goal of individualized therapy.

Our Mission is to employ an interdisciplinary approach to tailor therapies and enable the delivery of individualized medical practice.

Our Approach is to encourage interdisciplinary bench to bedside research, but place a greater emphasis on bedside to clinic through the development of individual treatment tools in the context of well thought out strategies for economic assessment, integration into health systems, and attention to medical decision making.  The areas of research that are key to this effort are:

• Pre-Clinical Pharmacogenomics
• Policy and Ethics
• Applied Technology / Laboratory-Based Medicine
• Clinical Pharmacogenomics
• Medical Decision Making / Outcomes
• Phenotype-Driven Therapy
• Evidence-Based Medicine
• Pharmaco-Economics

In order to bring these areas together, IPIT has been formed as a collaborative effort of the Schools of Pharmacy, Medicine, Public Health, Nursing, with substantial support of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Carolina Center for Genome Sciences.  Leadership in these key areas of research will be fostered by creating contiguous office and laboratory space to bolster collaborations and the development of comprehensive research investigations and treatment tools.  IPIT will also offer the services of core facilities in molecular genomics, cellular phenotyping, and bioinformatics to add to the excellent core facilities already existing at UNC.

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