I am glad to hear that your child found the right medication for him – that’s wonderful. It can be hard and scary and exhausting to get that dialed in. I don’t want to get too far off topic, but I want to avoid people doing extra things when they’re in triage mode.
I have read quite a lot of primary research on genetic testing for psych meds (such as GeneSight). A physician mentioned it to my own family member and I asked about the data. The doctor said that a company rep came by the practice to sell the tests to them, and they started offering them because insurance sometimes covers it. They actually asked me to research it for the practice, because I’m a neurophysiology professor. I did and reported back to the practice.
The evidence does not support these tests being helpful in general. They can be helpful in certain circumstances. Those circumstances include 1) when several other meds have been tried and were ineffective, or 2) when certain drugs with pharmacogenetic associations are being considered (more info, including a list of those can be found at FDA Announces Collaborative Review of Scientific Evidence to Support Associations Between Genetic Information and Specific Medications | FDA).
The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry recommends: “Clinicians avoid using pharmacogenetic testing to select psychotropic medications in children and adolescents” and “Future high-quality prospective studies to assess the clinical significance of pharmacodynamic and combinatorial pharmacogenomic testing in children and adolescents.”
A journal published by the American Psychiatric Association states “The FDA released a consumer warning about genetic tests that claim to predict patients’ responses to specific medications. The warning… holds particular importance for psychiatry…Although manufacturers market pharmacogenomic tests to clinicians as being able to predict (and thus improve) antidepressant outcomes, the currently available evidence does not support such claims”.
We elected not to do it for our own family member, despite it being covered by insurance. In their case, we did not want it to distract from other evidence-based treatments that might be helpful. The family member stayed on their first med, and pursued additional diagnoses and corresponding care that has helped a lot. That involved adding an additional med for an additional diagnosis. Their first med was managing that first diagnosis quite effectively and changing it would not have solved their particular issues, which were from an undiagnosed issue.
I say this mostly for those who may come across this thread and be interested in this type of testing. Of course, anyone can choose to do this testing for any reason if they’d like. I just want to put info out there that helps folks make informed decisions.