Drug Terminology
- Active ingredient – the substance in a drug that is pharmaceutically active
- Approved drug – a drug that has been approved for marketing by a regulatory body such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or the European Medicines Agency
- Excipient – an inactive substance used as a carrier for the active ingredients of a drug
- Medicinal product – any substance or combination of substances used for treating or preventing disease in humans
- Off-label use – the practice of prescribing a drug for an indication for which the drug has not been approved
- Orphan drug – a drug used to treat a rare medical condition, or orphan disease
- Placebo – a sham treatment given to a control group in a clinical study
- Prescription drug – a licensed medicine that can only be obtained by prescription from a doctor
- Standard treatment – a currently available drug used in an active control clinical study
Read more about this topic: List Of Clinical Research Topics
Famous quotes containing the word drug:
“If an addict who has been completely cured starts smoking again he no longer experiences the discomfort of his first addiction. There exists, therefore, outside alkaloids and habit, a sense for opium, an intangible habit which lives on, despite the recasting of the organism.... The dead drug leaves a ghost behind. At certain hours it haunts the house.”
—Jean Cocteau (1889–1963)