Poisoning & Toxicology

Toxicology is basically the science of poisons. It was familiar long ago that the toxicity of any substance is linked to dose. The 16th-century iconoclast Paracelsus is accredited with the statement: 'All matter are poisons, there is none which is not a poison. The right dose differentiates a poison from a remedy.' Toxicology had its origins in medicine and therapeutics, and to this day one of the key steps in the expansion of fresh drugs is the evaluation of the 'therapeutic window'. This window corresponds to the variety of doses where a beneficial effect is finding but below the dose which causes unacceptable side-effects.