Midterm module 1.4 Pharmacology

Question 1

What is a drug?

Answer 1

Any chemical that affects the physiological process of a living organism

Question 2

Why learn pharmacology?

Answer 2

1) Empower your decision making.
2) Provides safer patient care
3) Meet BCCNP standards of practice
4) Decreases medication errors

Question 3

Explain therapeutic classification vs pharmacological classification

Answer 3

What its useful for vs. how it does what it does

Question 4

what is a loading dose

Answer 4

a higher amount of the drug given normally once or twice to prime the blood stream with a level sufficient to induce a therapeutic response

Question 5

what is a maintenance dose

Answer 5

before plasma levels can drop back towards zero, intermittent maintenances doses are given to keep the plasma drug levels in the therapeutic range

Question 6

what are pharmacodynamics

Answer 6

what the drug do to the body & how they do it

Question 7

what are pharmacokinetic

Answer 7

how the body acts on the drug (absorb, excrete etc.)

Question 8

What is maximal efficacy

Answer 8

the largest effect that a drug can produce

Question 9

what is relative potency

Answer 9

amount of drug that must be given to elicit an effect

Question 10

what are agonist

Answer 10

molecules that activate receptors. When drugs act as agonist they bind to the receptor & mimic the action of the bodies own endogenous regulatory molecules.

Question 11

what are antagonists

Answer 11

produce their effects by preventing receptor activation by endogenous regulatory molecules & drugs. Can produce beneficial pharmacological effects by preventing the activation of receptors by agonists

Question 12

do all drugs need receptors?

Answer 12

no some act through physical or chemical interactions

Question 13

what is the therapeutic index?

Answer 13

measurement of drug safety. It is the ratio of LD 50 to ED50

Question 14

what are the 3 possible consequences of drug interactions

Answer 14

1) Potentiative interaction
2) Inhibitory interaction
3) Creation of a unique response

Question 15

what are the individual variations in drug responses

Answer 15

1) Body weight & composition
2) Age
3) Pathophysiology (Hepatic function, Renal Function, Acid-base imbalance, altered electrolytes)
4) Tolerance
5) placebo
6) Bioavailability
7) Variable absorption
8) Genetics
9) Gender
10) Race/Ethnocultural considerations
11) polypharmacy
12) Diet
13) Compliance

Question 16

What is pharmacogenetics

Answer 16

New field of study that develops effective & safe medication dosages specific to an indidivuals DNA, therefore decreasing adverse effects

Question 17

what is a frequency distribution curve?

Answer 17

A graphical representation of the number of patients responding to a drug action at different doses

Question 18

what is the median effective dose

Answer 18

the dose required to produce a specific therapeutic response in 50% of a group of patients

Question 19

what is the median lethal dose

Answer 19

The dose of a drug that will be lethal in 50% of a group of animals

Question 20

what is the therapeutic index

Answer 20

A measure of a drugs safety margin :the higher the value the safer the drug

Question 21

what is the median toxicity dose

Answer 21

the dose that will give a given toxicity in 50% of patients

Question 22

what is the the graded dose response

Answer 22

by observing & measuring a patients response obtained at different doses of the drug, one can explain several important clinical relationships

Question 23

what is potency

Answer 23

a drug that has more of this will produce a therapeutic effect at a lower dose, compared with other drugs in the same class

Question 24

what is efficacy

Answer 24

The magnitude of a maximal response that can be produced form a particular drug. A drug is considered to have more efficacy when it produces a higher maximal response

Question 25

what is receptor

Answer 25

A cellular macromolecule to which a medication binds to in orderr to initiate its effects