By Karen Whalen, Carinda Feild, Rajan Radhakrishnan
About this ebook
Lippincott Illustrated Reviews: Pharmacology, Seventh Edition, presents drug principles and major therapeutic classes through concise text and annotated illustrations. Designed for medical, pharmacy, and health science students, it connects pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics with organ-system pharmacology, clinical correlations, chapter outlines, and review questions with explanations for study and revision.
Inside this title
Annotated illustrations explaining drug mechanisms and physiological pathways
Current listed price $16.99Regular price $33.00Digital ebook
Visual explanations accompany the basic concepts of drug absorption, distribution, metabolism, elimination, and receptor activity. From these foundations, the review moves into autonomic, cardiovascular, renal, central nervous system, and endocrine pharmacology, alongside antimicrobial and anticancer agents. Organ-system coverage connects mechanisms with the conditions in which drug classes are discussed.
Brief outlines, bulleted explanations, and illustrations give the chapters a consistent study structure. Review questions with answer explanations provide opportunities to revisit mechanisms, interactions, and clinical correlations. The seventh edition also includes topics such as toxicology and pharmacogenomics, making it relevant to students consolidating pharmacology coursework and comparing the actions of drugs across different systems.
Whalen, with Feild and Radhakrishnan, frames pharmacology around the path from drug exposure to molecular target to physiological response. Annotated diagrams and side-by-side comparisons show why drugs with related uses differ in effect, duration, adverse reactions and interactions, and review questions test the reasoning.
Foundational chapters separate pharmacokinetics from pharmacodynamics, building a language for comparing agents later chapters apply those ideas to autonomic signaling, the central nervous system, circulation, endocrine regulation, infection and cancer. Final topics cover inflammatory mediators, agents used in other organ systems, toxicology and supplemental chapters. A reader can follow a drug class from its site of action to its intended effect and predictable limitations, using outlines and illustrations as a study scaffold rather than a substitute for the reasoning.
Connecting exposure to response
Absorption brings a drug into the circulation, distribution moves it between blood and tissue, and metabolism and elimination contribute to clearance. Bioavailability, volume of distribution and half-life describe different aspects, so two agents may reach similar targets at different times or concentrations. On the pharmacodynamic side, agonists activate receptors and antagonists reduce agonist activation, and a response curve separates potency, the concentration needed for an effect, from efficacy, the greatest effect the system allows.
Track how exposure changes
Read a dose-response curve
Separate potency from efficacy
Chs. 1–2
Drug action on neural signaling
Autonomic chapters group cholinergic and adrenergic agents by receptor location and action. Because a signaling change can affect several organs at once, tying a receptor to its normal role explains intended effects, unwanted responses, and it separates a direct agonist against an agent that alters transmitter availability. Central chapters cover neurodegenerative disease, anxiety, depression, psychosis, epilepsy, anesthesia, opioids and stimulants, where effects can arise through release, breakdown, reuptake, receptor activity or ion channels.
Use receptor and organ maps
Compare targets across central classes
Distinguish direct action from transmitter change
Chs. 3–15
Effects through circulation and kidney
Blood-pressure and heart-failure drugs can act on vascular tone, volume, cardiac work or neurohormonal signaling, and diuretics are grouped by the nephron site and transport process they affect, which links site of action to electrolyte handling. Antiarrhythmics change conduction or excitability, antianginal drugs shift the balance of oxygen demand and supply, and anticoagulants and antiplatelet agents act at different points in clot formation. Lipid drugs divide among synthesis, absorption and clearance.
Follow the regulated variable
Separate rhythm, ischemia and clotting
Sketch where each class acts
Chs. 16–22
Feedback in endocrine pharmacology
Pituitary and thyroid sections link hormone production and release to feedback. Depending on the class, a drug can replace a deficient hormone, change its production or act through a receptor, and where it enters the loop predicts effects on downstream response and on signals that regulate it. The diabetes chapter separates insulin replacement from agents affecting secretion, sensitivity, intestinal processes or glucose excretion, while reproductive, adrenal and bone chapters show hormones acting on many tissues.
Think in regulatory loops
Compare routes to changing metabolism
Mark where each drug enters the loop
Chs. 23–27
Selective toxicity and resistance
Antimicrobial classes vary in what they attack, including cell-wall construction, protein synthesis, nucleic acid processes and folate metabolism, and the text compares antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral and antiparasitic targets. Resistance may reduce access to a target, modify it or inactivate the drug, so knowing the target explains why activity changes. Anticancer therapy ranges from effects on division and DNA to more specific targets, and effects on healthy tissue follow from processes shared with the target.
Connect action to the organism
Consider effects on host tissues
Separate lost target response from poor access
Chs. 28–36 and 46–47
Benefit versus adverse effect
Histamine, serotonin, inflammatory mediators act differently depending on receptor and tissue, and pain-relief and anti-inflammatory chapters tie mediator change to symptom relief and unwanted effects. Later chapters apply class comparison to respiratory, gastrointestinal, urologic, hematologic and dermatologic topics, where route and tissue exposure alter response. Toxicology and drugs of abuse bring dose, timing and mechanism together, so comparing mechanism and time course helps separate an expected pharmacological effect from an interaction or another cause.
Follow mediators through tissues
Explain what makes an effect harmful
Compare mechanism and timing
Chs. 37–45
Chapter and section map
Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamicsCh. 1–2
Autonomic drugsCh. 3–7
Central nervous system drugsCh. 8–15
Cardiovascular and renal drugsCh. 16–22
Endocrine drugsCh. 23–27
Antimicrobial and cancer therapiesCh. 28–36
Other organ systems and toxicologyCh. 37–44
Drugs of abuse and antiparasitic drugsCh. 45–47
Key takeaways
For each class, link target to normal physiology, desired effect, important adverse effects.
Use pharmacokinetics to ask whether exposure reaches and persists at the target.
Read a dose-curve for the concentration needed and the maximum.
Medical, pharmacy and health science students who want a concise, heavily illustrated pharmacology review for coursework and exam preparation. Outlines and questions make it useful for revision.
Topics covered
illustrated pharmacology
drug pharmacokinetics
drug pharmacodynamics
autonomic drugs
CNS pharmacology
cardiovascular drugs
antimicrobial therapy
concentration-response curves
Questions about this ebook.
Edition, audience, and study-guide details at a glance.
What is Lippincott Illustrated Reviews: Pharmacology, 7th Edition about?
Lippincott Illustrated Reviews: Pharmacology, Seventh Edition, presents drug principles and major therapeutic classes through concise text and annotated illustrations. Designed for medical, pharmacy, and health science students, it connects pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics with organ-system pharmacology, clinical correlations, chapter outlines, and review questions with explanations for study and revision.
Which edition of Lippincott Illustrated Reviews: Pharmacology, 7th Edition is this?
This listing is for the 7th edition. Check the title, ISBN, and book details above before ordering, especially if your course or reading list names a specific edition.
Who is Lippincott Illustrated Reviews: Pharmacology, 7th Edition for?
Medical, pharmacy and health science students who want a concise, heavily illustrated pharmacology review for coursework and exam preparation. Outlines and questions make it useful for revision.
Does this page include a study guide?
Yes. This page includes an original study guide with six thematic sections, key takeaways, and a chapter and section map for structured reading.
