Misunderstood in Nursing
In the pharmacology courses that I teach for nursing, the concept of protein-bound vs. free drugs is often misunderstood. This concept describes how medications move around the body to arrive to their target tissue sites. Once they arrive at the sites, protein-bound drugs do not bind freely to the target site immediately because they need to dislodge from the protein they are using as a vehicle to travel the body, whereas free drugs can bind to the sites immediately. This impact how long a medication is in the body for, etc. An analogy for this is comparing protein-bound drugs to someone driving around the block in their car vs. someone jogging around the block (free drug). It is a more complex task for someone in their cars (protein-bound) to get into their house, compared to some who is jogging and simply needs to run up to the door and unlock it. Often students grasp this analogy once we have talked through it.
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