Pharmacology Exam 1 Drugs

Somatropin

• GH analog to help treat GH deficiency

• given as an injection at bedtime

Octerotide

• Somatostatin receptor ligand

• used to inhibit GH release when there’s too much GH

• given as an injection

Mecasermin

• recombinant IGF-1

• used to treat Laron dwarfism (primary GH deficiency, insensitivity to GH) since it cannot be treated with GHRH or GH analogs

Pegmisovant

• used to treat excess GH

• inhibits IGF-1 release and gets rid of negative feedback system

• prevents dimerization of GH with its receptor

• may accidentally promote GH release since it inhibits IGF-1, which helps to decrease GH release

prolactin

• hormone that promotes breast tissue to produce milk

• inhibited by dopamine

bromocriptine

• synthetic dopamine receptor agonist

• inhibits lactotroph cell growth to treat prolactinomas

desmospressin

• treatment for neurogenic diabetes

• treats insufficient ADH levels

tolvaptan

• treats SIADH (too much ADH)

• vasopressin antagonist

• more kidney-selective compared to conivaptan

• can cause concentrated urine as the kidneys are holing onto more water and not letting as much go into urine

conivaptan

• treats SIADH (too much ADH)

• vasopressin antagonist

• less selective than tolvaptan (will have more cardiovascular effects since it also acts on V1 receptors)

• Metabolized by CYP3A4 → drug interactions

oxytocin

• stimulates uterine contractions and milk ejection

• acts on a positive feedback loop (effects will keep going until an external stimulus stops it)

• used to induce contractions if someone has to give birth now

tocolytics (atosiban, terbutaline, nifedipine)

• used to suppress uterine contractions if a baby is premature and shouldn’t be born yet

• oxytocin receptor antagonist

• also stops contractions in order to give enough time to stabilize a patient

ketoconazole

• rarely used -azole antifungal

• non-selective → potential for drug-drug interactions

• blocks steps in steroidogenesis

Mifepristone

• treats Cushing’s disease (too many glucocorticoids)

• binds and antagonizes the corticoid receptor

• absolute contraindication in pregnancy → used to terminate pregnancies (due to it binding to progesterone receptors)

mitotane

• used to treat Cushing’s (too many glucocorticoids)

• destroys the zona fasciculata//reticularis but not zona glomerulosa