therapeutics

Therapeutics is the branch of medicine concerned with the prevention, relief, or cure of disease and the promotion of health through interventions that treat pathology after onset. It encompasses pharmacologic agents, biological therapies, physical modalities, and procedural approaches aimed at alleviating symptoms, slowing disease progression, restoring function, or achieving cure. Therapeutic strategies are selected based on clinical evidence, patient characteristics, risk-benefit considerations, and outcomes such as survival, function, and quality of life.

Major domains include pharmacotherapy (drugs and dosing regimens), biotherapeutics (monoclonal antibodies, vaccines, gene therapies), cell-based therapies, medical devices and procedures (surgery, radiation therapy, physical therapy), and supportive care. In modern medicine, therapeutics often involves multidisciplinary management and personalized or precision approaches that tailor treatments to molecular features of disease and patient preferences. Therapeutic effectiveness is assessed through clinical research, patient-reported outcomes, and real-world data.

The development and evaluation of therapeutics follow a regulatory pathway: discovery and preclinical testing, phased clinical trials (Phase I-III), regulatory approval, and post-marketing surveillance in Phase IV. Evidence from randomized controlled trials informs guidelines and standard care. Safety, efficacy, access, cost, and ethics shape therapeutic choices. Examples include antibiotics for infection, analgesics for pain, chemotherapy and targeted therapies for cancer, immunotherapies for autoimmune diseases, and gene or cellular therapies for selected conditions.