Dosage Safety Measures

Drugs produce beneficial or desired effects and, in addition, adverse effects. In determining the therapeutic dose range for a drug, research also focuses on doses that produce toxic effects. Dosage safety measures consist of different ways to determine a drug’s safe dose for medical use versus higher doses that, while producing therapeutic effects, also produce adverse effects. With these measures, the drug’s benefit-to-risk ratio, doses at which therapeutic effects greatly outweigh adverse effects, can be determined. These measures are determined during the drug development and clinical testing process before U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval.

Dose means quantity of a substance, while dosage is the rate of administration of a dose, though most often it is used as a synonym for dose. Dose usually applies ...