Knowra Drug metabolism Drug metabolism Drug metabolism is the chemical transformation of medicines and other foreign compounds by enzymes and biological processes. It can change a drug’s activity, duration, and routes of elimination.
Cytochrome P450 : A family of enzymes that oxidizes many drugs and other compounds, especially in the liver. These enzymes carry out many drug-oxidation reactions and drive clinically significant interactions.
Prodrug : A compound administered in a form that undergoes chemical conversion in the body to produce an active drug. Metabolism can activate a prodrug rather than simply inactivate or eliminate it.
Pharmacokinetics : The study of how the body absorbs, distributes, metabolizes, and excretes drugs. Drug metabolism is one of the processes that shapes a medicine’s course through the body.
Codeine : An opioid medicine whose analgesic effect partly depends on conversion to morphine by CYP2D6. Its variable activation makes enzyme genetics clinically consequential.
Phase I metabolism : Drug reactions such as oxidation, reduction, and hydrolysis that introduce or expose functional groups. This reaction stage often changes a drug before conjugation or elimination.
Pharmacogenomics : The study of how genetic variation affects responses to medicines. Inherited enzyme differences can alter drug concentrations, efficacy, and toxicity.
Pharmacodynamics : The study of the biochemical and physiological effects of drugs and their mechanisms of action. Metabolism changes drug exposure; pharmacodynamics describes effects at that exposure.
Warfarin : An oral anticoagulant whose dose requirements vary with metabolism and other patient factors. CYP2C9 variation and interacting drugs can change exposure and bleeding risk.
Phase II metabolism : Enzymatic conjugation reactions that attach groups such as glucuronide or sulfate to compounds. Conjugation commonly increases water solubility and supports excretion.
Drug interaction : A change in a drug’s effect or exposure caused by another drug, food, or substance. One compound can inhibit or induce enzymes that metabolize another.
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