Best practice in therapeutic drug monitoring |
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| Authors: | Annette S. Gross |
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| Affiliation: | Musculoskeletal Unit, Freeman Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE7 7DN |
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| Abstract: | It is the goal of Therapeutic Drug Monitoring (TDM) to use drug concentrations to manage a patient's medication regimen and optimise outcome. Limited resources require that drug assays should only be performed when they do contribute to patient management. For this to be the case a therapeutic drug monitoring service has a far greater role than just therapeutic drug measuring. This article describes the roles and functions of a Best Practice TDM service. The features which can and should be strived for in each step of the TDM process—the decision to request a drug level, the biological sample, the request, laboratory measurement, communication of results by the laboratory, clinical interpretation and therapeutic management—are discussed. |
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| Keywords: | therapeutic drug monitoring therapeutic management clinical interpretation |
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