• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.139-148
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• 2005

Appropriate drug classification is important fur rational drug consumption. This study was conducted to evaluate the appropriateness of current drug classification system and suggest possible ways for improving the system. Nonprescription drug market has been decreased. Since total 27,962 products had been classified (prescription 17,187 vs. nonprescription 10,775 products, 61.5% vs. 38.5%) in July 2000 for implementing separation of drug prescribing and dispensing system, there are no classification changes. Reclassification is not motivated by product holder and regulatory system did not lead classification change either. Consumers' ease access to some nonprescription drugs is demanded. But point of public awareness and cultural and health environmental views, saff drug use rather than advantages from broad supply of nonprescription drugs is more critical. We concluded that current 2-categorized (prescription and nonprescription) drug classification system is appropriate, and addition of general sale category should be approached carefully with long term Preparations such as establishment of better nonprescription drug consuming infrastructure by public information provision and education for improving public medicinal knowledge and strengthening self medication guidance, and review of current classification status of marketed drugs and switching possibilities. For systemizing and encouraging reclassification, introduction of regulatory renewal system as a continuous reevaluation program which is the best way to review appropriateness of drug classification as well as provision of detailed guidance for industry including policy, requirement and process fer reclassification application, are necessary.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.1237-1240
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• 2011

In this study, we have developed a ligand-based in-silico prediction model to classify chemical structures into hERG blockers using Bayesian and random forest modeling methods. These models were built based on patch clamp experimental results. The findings presented in this work indicate that Laplacian-modified naive Bayesian classification with diverse selection is useful for predicting hERG inhibitors when a large data set is not obtained.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.115-123
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• 2016

In this study, we collect various side effect pairs which are appeared frequently at many drugs, and select side effect pairs that have higher severity. For every selected side effect pair, we extract common genetic networks which are shared by side effects' genes and drugs' target genes based on PPI(Protein-Protein Interaction) network. For this work, firstly, we gather drug related data, side effect data and PPI data. Secondly, for extracting common genetic network, we find shortest paths between drug target genes and side effect genes based on PPI network, and integrate these shortest paths. Thirdly, we develop a classification model which uses this common genetic network as a classifier. We calculate similarity score between the common genetic network and genetic network of a drug for classifying the drug. Lastly, we validate our classification model by means of AUC(Area Under the Curve) value.

• Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation
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• v.40 no.spc
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• pp.1-7
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• 2010

Since the introduction of the biopharmaceutics classification system (BCS) in 1995, it has viewed as an effective tool to categorize drugs in terms of prediction for bioavailability (BA) and bioequivalence (BE). The BCS consist of four drug categories: class I (highly soluble and highly permeable), class II (low soluble and highly permeable), class III (highly soluble and low permeable) and class IV (low soluble and low permeable), and almost all drugs belong to one of these categories. Likewise, classifying drugs into four categories according to their solubility and permeability is simple and relatively not controversial, and thus the FDA adopted the BCS as a science-based approach in establishing a series of regulatory guidance for the industry. Actually, many pharmaceutical companies have gained a lot of benefits, which directly connect to cost loss and failure decrease in the early stage of drug development. Recently, instead of solubility, using dissolution characteristics (e.g. intrinsic dissolution rate) have provided an improvement in the classification in correlating more closely with in vivo drug dissolution rather than solubility by itself. Furthermore, a newly modified-version of BCS, biopharmaceutics drug disposition classification system (BDDCS), which classify drugs into four categories according to solubility and metabolism, has been introduced and gained much attention as a new insight in respect with the drug classification. This report gives a brief overview of the BCS and its implication, and also introduces the recent new trend of drug classification.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.260-267
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• 2012

The objective of this study was to investigate drug classification system in Korea and other developed countries. Laws and regulations of Korea regarding the system were retrieved from sources posted in Ministry of Government Legislation. We also reviewed previous research reports performed as part of government's effort to reform the system The system in the foreign countries was retrieved from the official homepage operated by each country's government. There have been two research funded by Korean government, which strongly suggested that the system should be reformed. However, we found that the system was never reformed and still effective. Drug classification system in US and most western countries consists of two categories, i.e., prescription drugs and non-prescription drugs except UK, which classifies into three categories: Prescription Only Medicines, Pharmacy Medicines, and General Sales List Medicines. Interestingly, in Japan, non-prescription drugs are further classified into three groups: Group 1, 2, and 3. Recently, Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) in Korea proposed a plan to reclassify all the approved drugs according to purportedly rational and scientific criteria. However, the plan does not include reform of the existing laws and regulations, which appears that it is just one-time action rather than a sustainable administration backed up by law. Therefore, it is recommended that Korean MOHW take appropriate action on laws and regulations with regard to the system to meet global harmonization standard.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.130-139
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• 2000

This study is intended to set the criteria for the classification of prescription and non-prescription drugs, and classify hospital pharmacy formulations according to the criteria. 717 hospital pharmacy formulations were collected ken the Center for review and evaluation of health insurance, and national provincial offices. Hospital pharmacy formulations were evaluated based on the 'Guidelines on the Hospital Pharmacy Formulations (Notification No. 2000-46)'by the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Drug classification advisory committee was composed of twelve medical and pharmaceutical specialists, and suggested opinions on the drug classification. Among 717 formulations, 651 drugs $(90.8\%)$ satisfied the basic conditions for the hospital pharmacy formulations. 312 formulations $(43.5\%)$ were classified as drugs for the disinfection and tests. For the rest of them, 231 formulations were classified as prescription drugs whereas 108 drugs were as non-prescription drugs. 56 non-prescription drugs were included as hospital formulations, because there were no therapeutic alternatives. Iu sum 599 drugs $(83.5\%)$ were suggested as hospital pharmacy formulations. The study also recommends pharmaceutical companies to produce drugs of limited commercial value, and doctors to change their unique prescribing behavior in order to prevent the abuse of hospital pharmacy formulations.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.213-220
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• 2010

Therapeutic duplication (TD) is a serious problem that frequently occurring primarily in the ambulatory setting in Korea. Implementation of concurrent drug utilization review (DUR) is a promising way to reduce inappropriate prescription and dispensing, and improve patient safety. This study was aimed to develop the process of DUR module of TD. Sixty-five drug ingredients classified into the drug category of the antipyretic, analgesic, and anti-inflammatory drug approved in Korea (The KFDA-dess nated classification codes of 114 or 264) were reviewed for this purpose. The drug ingredients (and products) were reclassified based on WHO's Anatomical, Therapeutic and Chemical (ATC) classification system. The clinical practice guidelines, textbooks and product labels on therapeutic uses of these drugs in Korea and several fores n countries were reviewed. If the drugs were categorized into the same therapeutically duplicable class, they were defined not to be used concurrently because the concurrent use was "therapeutically duplicated (unnecessary or even harmful)". Among the studied drug products, the following 5 drug classes were considto beas "therapeutic duplication": (1), on-t tooid DURnti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs, including s Dicylates), (2),Anilidts, (3),Opioids, (4) Ergot Dk Doids and (5) 5-$HT_1$ receptor agonot s. Therefore, concurrent prescribing or dispensing of more than 2 drug ingredients any in the above same classes should be considered as TD and needed to be warrant for careful review by pharmacists before dispensing.

• Herbal Formula Science
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.187-197
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• 2012

Objectives : The purpose of this study is to find a reasonable solution to a current status of drug classification between the drugs of western conventional (allopathic) medicine and Korean medicine. A clear and distinct concept on the drugs of allopathic medicine and Korean medicine based on reasonable concepts and broad consensus is a pressing issue in Korea, and will facilitate the development of herbal medicinal products and pharmaceutical industry. Methods : Considering the issue of drug classification from domestic and international regulations, we reviewed the current Drug Law of Korea and China, Guidance for Industry, Botanical Drug Products of USA, Directive 2004/24/EC of the European parliament and of the council. Results : In Korea, the drug classification of allopathic medicine and Korean medicine is quite vague even though differential licensure system is enforced for the clinicians of allopathic medicine and Korean medicine field. According to the definition in the Drug Law, the scope of Korean medicine drug is so broad that even a drug made of single-compound material, as well as herbal extract of crude mixture, is regarded as a drug of Korean medicine, as long as the material may be separated from medicinal herbs, animal tissues, or mineral resources. Only new compound not found in natural resources are outside of the scope of Korean medicine drug. In USA and EU, medicinal products manufactured from herbs are approved by separate regulations for the herbs with special waivers. In China, the category of new medicine and the definition of allopathic medicine and traditional chinese medicine are clearly specified and classified. Conclusions : As medicines are validated therapeutic materials for efficacy and toxicity, we suggest that generally the concept of conventional medicines is based on a single compound that has been synthesized and individually validated and that of Korean medicines is based on a compound extracted from natural materials or a complex of compounds that has been validated as a whole in its totality.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.335-347
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• 2009

This review covers current developments in molecular-based studies of the structure and function of carboxylesterases. To allay the confusion of the classic classification of carboxylesterase isozymes, we have proposed a novel nomenclature and classification of mammalian carboxylesterases on the basis of molecular properties. In addition, mechanisms of regulation of gene expression of carboxylesterases by xenobiotics, and involvement of carboxylesterase in drug metabolism are also described.

• Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.183-189
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• 2008

The present study compared the feasibility of Caco-2 and MDCK cells as an efficient in-vitro model for the drug classification based on Biopharmaceutics Classification System (BCS) as well as an in-vitro model for drug interactions mediated by P-gp inhibition or P-gp induction. Thirteen model drugs were selected to cover BCS Class I{\sim}IV$ and their membrane permeability values were evaluated in both Caco-2 and MDCK cells. P-gp inhibition studies were conducted by using vinblastine and verapamil in MDCK cells. P-gp induction studies were also performed in MDCK cells using rifampin and the P-gp expression level was determined by western blot analysis. Compared to Caco-2 cells, MDCK cells required shorter period of time to culture cells before running the transport study. Both Caco-2 and MDCK cells exhibited the same rank order relationship between in-vitro permeability values and human permeability values of all tested model compounds, implying that those in-vitro models may be useful in the prediction of human permeability (rank order) of new chemical entities at the early drug discovery stage. However, in the case of BCS drug classification, Caco-2 cells appeared to be more suitable than MDCK cells. P-gp induction by rifampin was negligible in MDCK-cells while MDCK cells appeared to be feasible for P-gp inhibition studies. Taken all together, the present study suggests that Caco-2 cells might be more applicable to the BCS drug classification than MDCK-cells, although MDCK cells may provide some advantage in terms of capacity and speed in early ADME screening process.