Noninvasive methods for drug measurement in pediatrics.

Infants and children present a special challenge to drug monitoring because the disposition of drugs differs from adults and because there are far fewer clinical studies designed for children than for adults. The excuse for this unfortunate situation is the imposition of severe technical and ethical constraints caused by blood sampling; however, in the past two decades, several new noninvasive methods to measure drugs have been tested and implemented in therapeutic drug monitoring. It is our hope that these new techniques will help advance the ability to diagnose and manage infants and young children.