The 57357 Pharmacy department’s personalized medication management unit just set up in operation a new Liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC-MS) equipment, the Triple quadruple LC/MS.
This is an upgraded version of the old one whose function is therapeutic drug monitoring. This function is all about checking on the effects of drugs on patients in order to counteract and reduce their toxicity while increasing their efficacy, ultimately ensuring patient safety. As we are monitoring serum levels of chemo therapies, we determine and measure the drug level in the patient’s blood and hence determine whether the dose prescribed is effective or toxic. The novelty in the upgraded version is its aptitude to testing and quantifying a wider range of medicines among which two for the first time in Egypt. Finally at Hospital 57357, we will be able to test and quantify the levels of 6mp drug, a very important medicine in the treatment of ALL patients, and Busulfan, another key treatment medicine in the case of bone marrow transplant patients.
Thanks to the new equipment, for the first time in Egypt, Hospital 57357’s personalized medication management unit will make available to 57357 patients and external ones these tests instead of sending them abroad.
Personalized medication management unit (PMMU) is one of a kind unit in the Middle-East and is considered as one of the most important and unique sections in Hospital 57357’s clinical pharmacy.
PMMU is concerned with tailoring medication doses according to patients needs through therapeutic drug monitoring and genotyping for certain genes that affect drug metabolism which is a novel approach called Pharmacogenetics, both practices being carried out the in PMMU. Moreover this unit is also conducting sample checks on the hospital’s supplies of medication to test for their viability and effectiveness.