Introduction to Pharmacology

Dr. Kiran Vakade

MD (clinical Pharmacology)
Fellowship in diabetes (Apollo Hospital)
Certificate course in thyroid disorders
Certificate course in evidence based diabetes management (CCEBDM)
Professor and HOD
Department of clinical pharmacology
DVVPF’s Medical college, Ahmednagar
What is Pharmacology?

Derived from the Greek word:

“Pharmacon”- Active principle/
Science that deals with drug/ medicine
study of the drug “Logos” – discourse/ to study

It encompasses all aspects of knowledge

about drugs, but most importantly those that
are relevant to effective and safe use for
medicinal purposes.
What is Pharmacology?
• The word pharmacology is derived from the Greek word –
‘Pharmacon’ meaning an active principle/drug/medicine
and ‘logos ‘meaning a discourse/ to study.
science that deals with the study of
• It is the
the drugs
• It deals with interaction of exogenously administered chemical
molecules with living system.
• It encompasses all aspects of knowledge about drugs, but most
importantly those that are relevant to effective and safe use
for medicinal purposes.
What is Drug?

According to WHO, “Drug is any

It is derived from substance or product that is used
French Word or intended to be used to modify
Drogue : Dry Herb
or explore physiological systems
or pathological states for the
benefit of the recipient.”
It is a chemical substance
used for diagnosis,
prevention, treatment or
cure of a disease.
What is Drug?
According to WHO,

“Drug is any substance or

product that is used or intended to be
used modify or explore
to
physiological systems or
pathological states for the benefit of
the recipient.”
 What is Drug?
• Unfortunately, “Drug” terminology also used for
addictive/abused/illicit substances.
• Actually “Drug” terminology should only be used to denote a
substance that has some health promoting/
therapeutic/ diagnostic application.
• Nevertheless, to avoid any misinterpretation, the term
‘medicine’ is used now a days to designate such substance in
place of the term ‘drug’.
 Dynamic
What is Pharmacodynamics? (Greek word):
Power

This includes physiological and biochemical

effects of drugs and their mechanism of
What the drug doses to action at organ system / subcellular /
the body. macromolecular levels.

Adrenaline  interaction with adrenoceptors G-

protein mediated stimulation of cell membrane
bound adenylyl cyclase  increased intracellular
cyclic 3´,5´AMP cardiac stimulation,
bronchodilatation, hepatic glycogenolysis and
hyperglycaemia
 Kinesis (Greek
What is Pharmacokinetics? word):
Movement

This refers to movement of the drug in and

What the body does to alteration of the drug by the body
the drug.

Paracetamol is rapidly and almost completely absorbed orally

attaining peak blood levels at 30–60 min; 25% bound to plasma It includes
proteins, widely and almost uniformly distributed in the body ADME study
(volume of distribution ~ 1L/kg); extensively metabolized in the liver,
primarily by glucuronide and sulfate conjugation into inactive
metabolites which are excreted in urine; has a plasma half-life (t½)
of 2–3 hours and a clearance value of 5 ml/kg/min.
What is Pharmacotherapeutics?

It is the application
of pharmacological
information together with
knowledge of the disease for its
prevention, mitigation or cure.
Selection of the most appropriate drug, dosage
and duration of treatment taking into account the
specific features of a patient are a part of
pharmacotherapeutics.
What is Clinical pharmacology ?
• It is the scientific study of drugs (both old and new) in
man.
• It includes pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic
investigation in healthy volunteers and in patients.
• Evaluation of efficacy and safety of drugs and comparative
trials with other forms of treatment; surveillance of patterns
of drug use, adverse effects, etc are also part of clinical
pharmacology.
• Aim of clinical pharmacology: To generate data for optimal
use of drugs and practice of ‘evidence based medicine’
What is Chemotherapy?

•It is the treatment of systemic

infection/malignancy with specific drugs
that have selective toxicity for the infecting
organism/ malignant cell with no/minimal
effects on the host cells.
What is ADR?

•These are thenoxious, undesired,

unintended effects of the drugs seen
at doses used for diagnosis, prevention and
treatment of the disease.
What is Pharmacovigilance?
• In simple word it is the monitoring of adverse drug
reaction.
• Pharmacovigilance has been defined by the WHO
(2002) as the ‘science and activities relating to the
Detection, Assessment, Understanding
and Prevention of adverse effects or any
other drug related problems.’
• International collaborating centre: Uppsala (Sweden).
• In India: CDSCO
What is Pharmacy?
• It is the art
and science of compounding and
dispensing drugs or preparing suitable
dosage forms for administration of drugs to man or
animals.
• It includes collection, identification, purification,
isolation, synthesis, standardization and quality
control of medicinal substances.
• Large scale manufacture of drugs is called
Pharmaceutics.
Toxicology

• It is the study
of poisonous effects of
drugs and other chemicals (household,
environmental pollutant, industrial, agricultural,
homicidal) with emphasis on detection,
prevention and treatment of
poisonings.
Drug compendia

“ “
compendia” is plural form of Drug compendia are compilations of
compendium . information on drugs in the form of
A compendium is a monographs; without going into the
compilation of knowledge theoretical concepts, mechanism of
about a particular subject action and other aspects which helps in
understanding the subjects
Drug compendia

Official compendia Non official compendia:

• These books are prepared under • Published by professional bodies
the authority of the government • Supplementary and dependable
of the respective countries. sources of information about the
• Has legal status drugs
Official compendia

•Pharmacopoeias

•Formularies
Pharmacopoeias:
description of chemical structure,
• They contain
molecular weight, physical and chemical
properties, solubility, identification and
assay methods, standards of purity, storage
conditions and dosage forms of officially
approved drugs in country .
• They are useful to drug manufacturers and regulatory authorities, but
not to doctors.
• Examples of official pharmacopoeias: Indian Pharmacopoeia (I.P.) ,British
Pharmacopoeia (B.P.), United State Pharmacopoeia (U.S.P.) European
Pharmacopoeia (Eur P)etc.
Pharmacopoeias:
Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP)

The IP is the official pharmacopoeia of India.

published by the Indian
The Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP) is
Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC) on behalf of Ministry of
Health & Family Welfare, Government of India to fulfil the
requirements of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940.
 For manufacturing, selling medicine in India market IPC sets
standards.
Indian Pharmacopoeia 2022

• 9th edition
• Released on 1st July 2022 by Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya in IPC conference 2022.
• Salient features:
contains a total of 92 new monographs including 60 Chemical, 21
Vitamins, Minerals, Amino acids, Fatty acids etc., 3 Biotechnology-derived
Therapeutic Products, 4 Human Vaccines, 2 Blood and Blood Related Products, 2
Herbs and Herbal Related Products
7 Phytopharmaceutical Ingredient Category monographs.
total number of 3152 monographs.
In additions, 12 new general chapters have also been introduced.
Several monographs and general chapters have also been revised to
update them as per current global requirements and to harmonize with other
pharmacopoeias like USP, BP, EP, etc.
Drug formularies:
• These are the booklets containing information related with
dosage forms, dose, indications, adverse effects,
contraindications, precautions, storage of the selected
drugs that are available for medicinal use in a country.
• Drugs formularies are important for doctor’s point of view.
• Drugs are categorised by their therapeutic class.
• Rational fixed dose combinations also included in some drug formularies.
• Brief guidelines for the treatment of selected conditions are provided
• Examples: National Formulary of India (NFI), British National Formulary (BNF)
• BNF also contains the brand names with cost. However NFI does not include
brand names and cost.
National Formulary of India 2021

• 6th edition release on 28th October

2021
• 34 therapeutic categories chapters
including 591 drug monographs
and 23 appendices are included in
this edition.
Non official Compendia
• Published by professional bodies
• Supplementary and dependable sources of information about the
drugs
• Example of non official pharmacopeia :
Merc Index
Extra Pharmacopoeia (Martin Dale)
The united states dispensary
Pharmacogenetics:

•Pharmacogenetics: it is the science that

deals with the study of genetic basis for
variation in the drug response.
Pharmacogenomics

•Pharmacogenomics: it deals with the use of

genetic information to guide the choice of
drugs in a person. Thus it helps to tailor the
drug and the dose based on the genotype of
a person.