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The level of digoxin for treatment is typically 0.5-2 ng/mL. [8] Since this is a narrow therapeutic index, digoxin overdose can happen. A serum digoxin concentration of 0.5-0.9 ng/mL among those with heart failure is associated with reduced heart failure deaths and hospitalizations. [9]
In toxicity, the usual supportive measures are provided. If arrhythmias prove troublesome, or malignant hyperkalaemia occurs (inexorably rising potassium level due to paralysis of the cell membrane-bound, ATPase-dependent Na/K pumps), the specific antidote is antidigoxin (antibody fragments against digoxin, trade names Digibind and Digifab). [7]
That immediately gets the drug's concentration in the body up to the therapeutically-useful level. First day: 1000 mg; the body clears 100 mg, leaving 900 mg. On the second day, the patient takes 100 mg, bringing the level back to 1000 mg; the body clears 100 mg overnight, still leaving 900 mg, and so forth.
Digoxin toxicity can emerge during long-term therapy as well as after an overdose. It can occur even when the serum digoxin concentration is within the therapeutic range when one of the following is present: [4] [5] Hemodynamically unstable arrhythmia; End organ damage; digoxin level > 4 ng/ml if chronic ingestion
Typically, digoxin levels are considered therapeutic for heart rate control between 0.5 and 2.0 ng/mL (or 0.6 and 2.6 nmol/L). [37] In suspected toxicity or ineffectiveness, digoxin levels should be monitored. Plasma potassium levels also need to be closely controlled (see side effects, below).
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.
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In a medicine that is administered periodically, the trough level should be measured just before the administration of the next dose in order to avoid overdosing. [3] A trough level is contrasted with a "peak level" (C max), which is the highest level of the medicine in the body, and the "average level", which is the mean level over time. It is ...