Ultraviolet laser irradiation of a lithium niobate +z polar surface enables the production of ridge waveguides. Ultraviolet laser induced inhibition of poling is used to define an inverted domain pattern which transforms into a ridge structure by differential etching in Hydrofluoric acid. The laser irradiation step also induces a refractive index change that provides the vertical confinement wi...

BACKGROUND Digoxin remains widely used today despite its narrow therapeutic index and toxicity. The objective of this study was to investigate the percentage of inappropriate use of digoxin and long-term outcomes of elderly patients hospitalized for digoxin toxicity. METHODS The study included 99 consecutive patients hospitalized for digoxin toxicity. The other study criteria for the inapprop...

Monitoring cyclosporine therapy is required by the narrow therapeutic index, high pharmacokinetic variability, the increased risk of drug interactions CYP 3A4dependent and nephrotoxicity of the substance substance. The controversies raised by clinical practice are the best time of sampling, the analytical methods used and the feasibility of the pharmacokinetic models to estimate the useful conc...

Historically, most patients who required parenteral anticoagulation received heparin, whereas those patients requiring oral anticoagulation received warfarin. Due to the narrow therapeutic index and need for frequent laboratory monitoring associated with warfarin, there has been a desire to develop newer, more effective anticoagulants. Consequently, in recent years many novel anticoagulants hav...

BACKGROUND information on medication use and risk factors among older people residing in retirement villages and their uptake of medication reviews are scant. OBJECTIVES to identify medication use issues and risk factors for medication-related problems among retirement village residents and to evaluate the uptake of government-subsidised Home Medicines Review (HMR) services in this population...

BACKGROUND Warfarin is used for the prevention of stroke in chronic atrial fibrillation. The product has a narrow therapeutic index and to obtain treatment success, patients must be maintained within a given therapeutic range (International Normalised Ratio;INR). To ensure a wise allocation of health care resources, scrutiny of costs associated with various treatments is justified. The objectiv...

Medication errors have been increasingly recognized as a major cause of iatrogenic illness and system-wide improvements have been the focus of prevention efforts. Critically ill patients are particularly vulnerable to injury resulting from medication errors because of the severity of illness, need for high risk medications with a narrow therapeutic index and frequent use of intravenous infusion...

Polymorphism in genes coding drug-metabolizing enzymes may cause individual differences in the effectiveness and toxicity of many medications, including cytostatics. Although in recent years intensive treatment has positively influenced the prognosis in leukemias, many adverse effects resulting from nonspecific actions and the narrow therapeutic index of anti-cancer drugs are still observed dur...

Lithium has a narrow therapeutic index with a subtle balance between effectiveness and adverse effects. Current guidelines recommend the use of lithium as a treatment for acute bipolar depression; however, the therapeutic range for the treatment has not been fully defined. Recently, the adjunctive lower lithium dose in bipolar depression has revealed potential efficacy; however, no study has in...

A pharmacogenetics is a new discipline, it is anticipated to have applications in many fields, including drug development, therapeutic dosing guidance, and disease risk stratification. Rai1 has suggested that pharmacogenetic testing during drug development trials could create a large number of drug compounds targeted to particular pharmacogenetic phenotypes. This approach in turn would necessit...