Clinical pharmacokinetics: the pharmacological monitoring of plasmatic levels in therapy.

Recent developments of clinical pharmacology show that in particular circumstances the determination of the plasmatic levels of drugs seems to be the best way to insure the best dosage schedules for each patient. For this and other reasons, at the Hospital Pharmacological Service a clinical pharmacokinetic laboratory was set up about two years ago. It is involved both in pharmacokinetic research with the aim of pointing out the reasons of a quantitatively or qualitatively unusual response to the drug (generally lack of therapeutic effect or untoward effects) and in finding the best practical administration route for each patient of those drugs which show a high incidence of undesirable side effects. At the moment, salicylates, quinidine, phenobarbital, phenytoin, theophylline, digoxin and gentamicin are routinely monitored. Other drugs under examination are valporic acid, methotrexate, etc. In the present paper the first results obtained are reported.