Genetic Predisposition to Critical Illness in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit

Much progress has been made in the past decade in the understanding of the genetic contribution to the development of human disease in general, and critical care illness specifically. With the mapping of the human genome and on-going mapping of genetic polymorphisms and haplotypes in humans, the field of critical care is now in prime position to study the impact of genetics on common illnesses that affect children who require critical care, to examine how differences of the host defense response lead to variable outcomes in outwardly appearing similar disease states, and to study how genetic differences in response to therapy will help practitioners tailor therapeutic interventions to an individual child’s genetic composition. While we are still years away from true individualized medicine, we are now closer than ever to understanding why two might children respond to the same environmental insult in vastly different ways.