Monitoring drug therapy

The effects of drugs vary significantly between individuals, and monitoring is essential to ensure the desired effect is achieved. Wherever possible, therapeutic effects should be monitored directly, using a measure that captures how the patient feels, functions or survives (a ‘clinical endpoint’). In practice, it is often not feasible to use a clinical endpoint to guide therapy, particularly for preventive treatments. The next best option is to use a surrogate endpoint: a measure that predicts whether the clinical endpoint will be achieved.
Source: Medicine - Category: Internal Medicine Authors: Tags: Clinical pharmacology Source Type: research