How Medicine Works. So modern medication is a truly a wonderful and amazing thing. In that if you are not feeling well, if you are sick probably a drug out there to make you feel better.
In this post of Bhai Loog we are going to answer how actually medicine works.
A drug is chemical or a biological substance that effects the body and its functions. Drugs aborbtion is when a drug enters the bloodstream. The level of absorption can effect the speed and the quantity of the drug and site of action. This is termed bioavailability. If a tablet release the drug quickly, bloodlevels may become too high, whereas slow release may result in low levels of absorption.
Additional factors effecting absorption and bioavailabilty include the properties of the drug, and the physiology of the person such as pH levels in the stomach and its speed of emptying. Therefore specific formulations are used to release the drug at the desired speed. Common formulations include : tablets, capsules, suppositories, trans-dermal patches, and solutions.
Drug metabolism is the process by which the body breaks down drugs which mainly occurs by means of enzymes located in the liver. Many factors including intake of specific foods and other drugs can increase or decrease the speed at which drugs are broken down and thus determine their levels within the blood. A drug may be broken down to stop it from working. However. there are other drugs that need to be broken down or modified before they become active. These are known as prodrugs. Some drugs are directly eliminated from the body by the kidneys in urine. For this to happen the drug must be water soluble. Drugs that are not water soluble may be metabolized by the liver or enzymes in the blood into breakdown products that can be eliminated in urine. Diseases that affect the liver or the kidneys can cause blood levels of a drug to increase.
If you take a medication, that pill has to dissolve. It gets absorbed in the stomach and that point and at that point its in your blood stream. It will go all over the body and that's why lots of drugs work pretty well but some times have some side effects because that drug gone places where it didn't really needed in the first place.
A lot of medications work almost like a locking key, that's looking for the specific receptors where it can fit into and if it can't fit that receptor appropriately it goes just by it. So, that's were the some of targeted therapies, especially in the area of cancer are coming up and its looking for that very specific receptor and it can get into the cell and it might turn something on or turn something turn off. That's gonna help the body to fight the cancer to make sure the medicine is working the best of its ability you need to do some work too.
You need to make sure you are following the instructions that the physician or a prescriber and pharmacist have given you. That's really important because as good as the medication is, if you are not taking it correctly it's not gonna do its job.
Written By : Bhai Loog