Towards point of care systems for the therapeutic drug monitoring of imatinib.

Therapeutic drug monitoring is used in the clinical setting in the optimisation of dosages to overcome inter-patient pharmacokinetic variability, increasing efficacy whilst reducing toxicity. Imatinib is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, displaying large variations in plasma concentrations that impact therapeutic success. As a result, imatinib has been the focus in the development of innovative techniques, aimed at its quantification in plasma. Liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry is currently the gold standard; however, cost and availability of the equipment limit its wider application in clinical settings. Recent advances in the field have shown Raman spectroscopy and electrochemistry to be key techniques for the development of promising analytical tools. This article reviews the latest advances towards less costly, more portable solutions that can be used at the point of care.