PHARMACEUTICAL CALCULATIONS: A CONCEPTUAL APPROACH

Pharmaceutical Calculations: A Conceptual Approach, is a book that combines conceptual and procedural understanding for students and will guide you to master prerequisite skills to carry out accurate compounding and dosage regimen calculations. It is a book that makes the connection between basic sciences and pharmacy. It describes the most important concepts in pharmaceutical sciences thoroughly, accurately and consistently through various commentaries and activities to make you a scientific thinker, and to help you succeed in college and licensure exams. Calculation of the error associated with a dose measurement can only be carried out after understanding the concept of accuracy versus precision in a measurement. Similarly, full appreciation of drug absorption and distribution to tissues can only come about after understanding the process of transmembrane passive diffusion. Early understanding of these concepts will allow reinforcement and deeper comprehension of other related concepts taught in other courses.

More weight is placed on the qualitative understanding of fundamental concepts, like tonicity vs osmotic pressure, diffusion vs osmosis, crystalloids vs colloids, osmotic diuretics vs plasma expanders, rate of change vs rate constants, drug accumulation vs drug fluctuation, loading dose vs maintenance dose, body surface area (BSA) vs body weight (BW) as methods to adjust dosages, and much more, before considering other quantitative problems. In one more significant innovation, the origin and physical significance of all final forms of critical equations is always described in detail, thus, allowing recognition of the real application and limitations of an equation. Specific strategies are explained step-by-step in more than 100 practice examples taken from the fields of compounding pharmacy, pharmaceutics, pharmacokinetics, pharmacology and medicine.

Dr. Savva graduated from the UPitt, School of Pharmacy, Pittsburgh, PA, USA. As a graduate student he conducted biophysical research on the grafting and interaction of water-soluble synthetic polymers with liposomes. His early work as a tenured professor at Long Island University was focused on a priori design of pH-sensitive non-viral gene delivery system and provided few molecular descriptors, such as molecular elasticity, for lipid-mediated transfection activity. He has also applied thermodynamic concepts to assess experimental system properties of sparingly soluble anticancer drugs, and more recently he is engaged in novel research related to physiological parameterization of the classical pharmacokinetic compartments.

In addition to his research in drug delivery, Dr. Savva teaches the courses of Pharmaceutical Calculations, Physical Pharmacy, Dosage form design, Drug Compounding, Pharmacokinetics and Clinical Pharmacokinetics, and conducts theoretical research on various topics of Mathematical Pharmaceutics and Pharmacokinetic modeling.

Dr. Savva plans for learning and teaches for understanding. His teaching philosophy revolves around three words: knowledge, dedication and methodology. He enjoys the quite time required to study, understand and organize all material involved in a subject. As a teacher and a book author, students’ retention without compromising their academic success has always been his priority. Conceptually written books increase student engagement, promote highly successful examinations and effectively boost students’ performance to their full potential.