"We think that clinical trials in the future ought to be done as N-of-1 (single subject) experiments," Hood said. "In a cancer trial we can use the individual data clouds to actually identify biomarkers that distinguish the responders from the non-responders. Then what we will do is a second trial of 50 patients with all responders. And if you get a 98 percent response rate, the FDA will approve your drug in the blink of an eye. You go from spending $1.5 billion on a clinical trial to spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a clinical trial." Hood and his collaborators completed a study that used dynamic data clouds to improve wellness. "A wellness study of 108 individuals using personal, dense, dynamic data clouds," published in Nature Biotechnology in 2017, involved collecting the complete genome sequences of 108 volunteers, including Hood. The subjects each gave blood draws every three months to measure 1,200 analytes of three classes: clinical chemistries, metabolites and proteins. They measured gut microbiome every three months and used Fitbit and other devices for digital health measurements. "What these gave us for each individual was longitudinal data clouds that, when analyzed, led to actionable possibilities that if executed by the individual could either improve their wellness and/or let them ameliorate or avoid disease," Hood said. "The big question in all of this is: How do you change social behavior? What we used were wellness coaches, trained in psychology and nutrition and nursing, who were magnificent. They would elicit from the individual exactly what they wanted in their health objectives, and this is not easy to do." - www.benzinga.com