title: Prediction of maintenance dose required to attain a desired drug concentration at steady-state from a single determination of concentration after an initial dose.
abstract: Strong correlations have been reported between drug concentrations at steady-state and a single drug concentration determined sometime after an initial dose for lithium, nortriptyline, imipramine, desipramine, choramphenicol and theophylline. The mathematical basis of these relationships suggests that a one point method for predicting steady-state drug concentrations and individual dosing requirements should be widely applicable to most drugs and should be valid for patients having a wide range of drug half-lives. A method is presented for evaluating the optimum time of blood sampling to determine a drug concentration in serum of plasma that best correlates with steady-state levels and for defining the range of drug half-lives beyond which the predictive approach is likely to give poor results.
mesh_terms: D000929:Antidepressive Agents, Tricyclic / Q000097:blood; D002701:Chloramphenicol / Q000097:blood; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D006207:Half-Life; D006801:Humans; D008094:Lithium / Q000097:blood; D008433:Mathematics; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000097:blood*; D013806:Theophylline / Q000097:blood
chemical_list: D000929:Antidepressive Agents, Tricyclic; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations; D002701:Chloramphenicol; D008094:Lithium; D013806:Theophylline