Genetics as a side‑effect detective for antipsychotic medicines
Side‑effects are one of the main reasons people stop taking antipsychotic medicines — even when the drugs are helping with symptoms. But when someone reports “I’ve gained weight” or “my blood pressure has changed”, it’s often hard to know whether the drug truly caused it, which biological target is responsible, and whether that target is the one we wanted to hit in the first place.
In work led by Andrew Elmore, published in PLOS Genetics, we combine pharmacology (what receptors a drug binds) with human genetics (natural experiments) to map side‑effects back to specific receptors.