Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and Safety Considerations of Lithium Therapy in Mood Disorder

Background: To study the Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and safety considerations of lithium in mood disorders. Methodology: The study was carried out for a period of six months, a total of 35 participants were screened from both in-patients and out-patients who visited the Department of Psychiatry, diagnosed with Mood Disorders and on lithium therapy. From that, 30 patients were enrolled into the study based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. All categorical variables would be described as frequency and percentage. All continuous variables would be described as mean. Result: A total of 30 Bipolar Affective Disorder (BAPD) patients, in which 19 females and 11 males were enrolled in the study. The mean age of respondents was 45±15.59 (18-72 years). In post follow up, there was a significant increase in therapeutic level and reduction of sub-therapeutic and supra-therapeutic levels. Pearson Correlation between average serum lithium concentration and average total daily dose was found to be 0.9994 which means there is an extremely high positive linear correlation between variables. A consistent and strong relationship (0.9706) among patient weight and serum lithium levels. A strong positive correlation (0.996) among patient age and serum lithium levels. Conclusion: This study underscores that personalized lithium monitoring improves treatment outcomes and safety, with weight-based dosing offers potential benefit and large study needed for confirming long-term effects. Keywords: TDM, Lithium, Drug Safety, ADR, BPAD