Answer to Question #221694 in Evolution for Siyabonga

Question

Describe enteral and parenteral administration of drugs and explain how oral, intravenous, intramuscular or subcutaneous administration of a drug impacts on the pharmacokinetic parameters of the drug.

Answer 1

Enteral administration involves the esophagus, stomach, and small and large intestines. Methods of administration include oral, sublingual, and rectal. Parenteral administration is via a peripheral or central vein.

Parenteral drug administration can be taken literally to mean any non-oral means of drug administration, but it is generally interpreted as relating to injection directly into the body, by-passing the skin and mucous membranes. The common routes of parenteral administration are intramuscular (IM), subcutaneous and IV.

Each route of administration results in attendant complications related to mucosal damage, carcinogenesis and risk of infection. Negative reinforcement or withdrawal is a major drive to recurrent use. Many illicit drugs have pharmacological features that promote dependence, including long half-life, low free drug clearance and sufficient drug exposure to allow development of tolerance. The preventive or reductive pharmacotherapeutics of illicit drug use makes use of several subsets of agents: those which act on the same receptor or system as the illicit drug, those which produce an adverse reaction on consumption of the illicit drug and those which symptomatically attenuate illicit drug withdrawal symptoms.