New book explores benefits and limitations of 'personalised medicine'

A new book co-authored by the Faculty of Law's Dr Michael Morrison sets out a critical sociological approach to 'personalised medicine', highlighting its limitations and flaws but also its potential to improve medicine in the future.

Personalised Medicine: A Critical Approach to Data-Driven Medicine (Routledge) is written by Dr Morrison, Senior Researcher at HeLEX (the Centre for Health, Law and Emerging Technologies), alongside Dr Saheli Datta Burton (UCL), Dr Elisa Lievevrouw (KU Leuven), and Elisabetta Biasin (KU Leuven). It is also available open access in digital form.

Personalised medicine (sometimes known as precision medicine) tailors healthcare to an individual patient's unique characteristics. Bringing together perspectives from science and technology studies, medical sociology, law and bioethics, the book traces personalised medicine from its historical roots in disease classification and predictive genetics to its data-driven present of digital infrastructures, algorithmic prediction and precision therapeutics.

Across seven chapters, it explores how measurement, classification and datafication shape medical knowledge; how infrastructures and platforms distribute benefits and risks; how publics are imagined as patients, consumers and citizens; and how privacy, access and equity are negotiated in global health systems. The book concludes by outlining possible futures grounded in solidarity, patient-centred care and democratic innovation, offering practical ways to shift personalised medicine from a privilege for the few to a shared public good.

The book is aimed at scholars and practitioners in science and technology studies, sociology of medicine, health policy and bioethics, as well as clinicians and policymakers.