fighting diseases with drugs

• Treating the symptoms can involve:

  • Decognestans
  • Painkillers like aspirin for fever and inflammation, willow bark to prevent heart conditions, and digitalis from foxgloves
• Curing the illness can be done with fungi, which provide antibiotics like penicillin
• Developing new drugs requires them to be:

  • Safe (non-toxic, few side effects)
  • Effective (treat symptoms, cure, prevent like vaccines)
  • Stable (for storage and use under normal conditions)
  • Successfully taken into and out of the body (reach its target, safely broken down)
• In pre-clinical trials, drug development progresses from computer models to cells, tissues, organs (for safety), and then animals (for effectiveness, safety, and dosage)
• Clinical trials involve:

  • Small group healthy volunteers (to determine safety and dosage)
  • Small group volunteers suffering from the illness (to assess effectiveness)
  • Large group volunteers suffering from the illness (to study long-term effects) before the drug can be licensed
• Definitions:

  • Antibiotics: drugs that cure infections by killing or preventing the growth of bacteria
  • Antiseptics: chemicals that kill bacteria on the skin surface (too potent to be taken into the body)
  • Painkillers: drugs that can treat the symptoms of the illness
  • Clinical trials: drug tests conducted on human volunteers
  • Placebo: a 'pretend' drug that only has psychological effects and is taken by a control group
  • Blind trial: occurs when the patient is unaware who has been given the drug or the placebo
  • Double-blind trial: occurs when both the patient and the doctor are unaware who has been given the drug or the placebo, greatly reducing bias