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This type of adverse effect that results from pharmaceutical drug exposure is commonly due to interactions of the drug with its intended target. In this case, both the therapeutic and toxic targets are the same. To avoid toxicity during treatment, many times the drug needs to be changed to target a different aspect of the illness or symptoms.
Even less safe are drugs such as digoxin, a cardiac glycoside; its therapeutic index is approximately 2:1. [12] Other examples of drugs with a narrow therapeutic range, which may require drug monitoring both to achieve therapeutic levels and to minimize toxicity, include dimercaprol, theophylline, warfarin and lithium carbonate.
Toxicity is the degree to which a chemical substance or a particular mixture of substances can damage an organism. [1] Toxicity can refer to the effect on a whole organism, such as an animal, bacterium, or plant, as well as the effect on a substructure of the organism, such as a cell (cytotoxicity) or an organ such as the liver (hepatotoxicity).
Negative values of the decimal logarithm of the median lethal dose LD 50 (−log 10 (LD 50)) on a linearized toxicity scale encompassing 11 orders of magnitude. Water occupies the lowest toxicity position (1) while the toxicity scale is dominated by the botulinum toxin (12). [107] The LD 50 values have a very wide range.
Alcohol can exacerbate the symptoms and may directly contribute to increased severity of symptoms. The reasons for toxicity vary depending on the mixture of drugs. Usually, most victims die after using two or more drugs in combination that suppress breathing, and the low blood oxygen level causes brain death.
While fatal overdoses are highly associated with drugs such as opiates, cocaine and alcohol, [2] deaths from other drugs such as caffeine are extremely rare. [21] This alphabetical list contains 634 people whose deaths can be reliably sourced to be the result of drug overdose or acute drug intoxication.
Karyn Hascal, The Healing Place’s president and CEO, said she would never allow Suboxone in her treatment program because her 12-step curriculum is “a drug-free model. There’s kind of a conflict between drug-free and Suboxone.” For policymakers, denying addicts the best scientifically proven treatment carries no political cost.
Drug use contributes to 500,000 deaths worldwide, with opioid overdose resulting in approximately 115,000 of these deaths in 2018. [1] This is up from 18,000 deaths in 1990. [ 13 ] [ 14 ] In 2018, approximately 269 million people had engaged in drug usage at least once, 58 million of which used opioids. [ 1 ]