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Detoxication

Detoxication products are the major metabolites formed from most drug metabolism. There are two common patterns observed:

1. A drug with potent pharmacological activity is converted to a major metabolite with markedly reduced or no pharmacological activity (e.g., Pentobarbital and Hydroxypentobarbital)
2. A drug is converted to a metabolite with roughly equivalent or slightly lower pharmacological activity.

Detoxication differs from detoxification. Detoxification is the process of removing toxins from the body, while detoxication is the process of preventing toxic entities from entering the body in the first place.