Clinical pharmacology = disease progression + drug action.

Abstract

Clinical pharmacology is concerned with understanding how to use medicines to treat disease. Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics have provided powerful methodologies for describing the time course of concentration and effect in individuals and in populations. This population approach may also be applied to describing the progression of disease and the action of drugs to change disease progress. Quantitative models for symptomatic and disease-modifying effects of drugs are valuable not only for describing drugs and diseases but also for identifying criteria to distinguish between types of drug actions, with implications for regulatory decisions and long-term patient care.