Importance of biochemistry in MEDICINE
Biochemistry is a valuable subject in medicine without which there would have been
no such advancement in the field.
Physiology: Biochemistry helps one understand the biochemical changes
and related physiological alteration in the body. Pathology of any disease is
studied through biochemical changes.
Pathology: Based on the symptoms described by the patient, the physician
can get a clue on the biochemical change and the associated disorder. For
example, if a patient complains about stiffness in small joints, then the
physician may predict it to be gout and get confirmed by evaluating uric acid
levels in the blood as uric acid accumulation in blood results in gout.
Nutrition deficiency: In the present scenario, many people rely on taking
multivitamin & minerals for better health. The function and role of
the vitamin in the body are described only by biochemistry.
Hormonal deficiency: There are many disorders due to hormonal imbalance
in especially women and children. The formation, role of hormones in the
normal body function is taught in biochemistry by which the physician can
understand the concerned problem during treatment.
Importance of biochemistry in NURSING
In nursing, the importance of clinical biochemistry is invaluable. When a patient is in
the hospital nurses, need to keep a watch on how his condition is progressing
through clinical biochemistry. That is the treatment for helping him recover from said
condition etc. Almost all diseases or disorders have some biochemical involvement.
So the diagnosis of any clinical condition is easily possible by biochemical
estimations.
1. Kidney function test: For example in kidney disorders, other chemotherapy
treatment, etc. urine test help understand the extent of excretion of drugs
or other metabolites, the change in pH, the color of urine, etc.
2. Blood test: In diabetes, biochemical analytical test for blood glucose level
(above 150mg/deciliter) helps one understand the severity of diabetes
disorder. Another biochemical analysis for ketones bodies in urine also
indicates the stage of diabetes. The appearance of ketone bodies or ketone
urea is mostly the last stage of diabetes.
3. Liver function tests help understand the type of disease or damage to the
liver, the effect of any medication on the liver, etc.
4. Serum cholesterol test: Evaluation of blood cholesterol level and other
lipoproteins helps to understand the proneness of the patient to cardiovascular
diseases.
Thus the importance of clinical biochemistry is to help the nurse monitor the
patient’s condition regularly during the treatment.
Importance of biochemistry in AGRICULTURE
In agriculture, biochemistry plays a valuable role in farming, fishery, poultry,
sericulture, beekeeping, etc.
Prevent diseases: It helps for prevention, treatment of diseases and also
increases the production or yield.
Enhance growth: Biochemistry gives an idea of how the use
of fertilizers can increase plant growth, their yield, quality of food, etc.
Enhance Yield: Some hormones promote growth, while others encourage
flowering, fruit formation, etc. In fisheries, the use of substances to promote
fish growth, their reproduction, etc. can be understood.
Adulteration: Even the composition of food material produced, their
alteration or adulteration for example in honey can be found by biochemical
tests. Biochemistry tests help prevent contamination.
Biochemical tests for the pesticide residues or other toxic waste in plant,
food grain and soil can be evaluated. Hence during import and export of food
grains, a biochemical check of the toxic residues is done to fix the quality.
In animal husbandry, the quality of milk can be checked
by biochemical tests. It also helps diagnose any disease condition in animals
and birds.
In fisheries, the water quality is regularly monitored by biochemical tests.
Any drastic change in water chemistry & composition of fishery ponds can lead
to the vast death of fishes and prawns. Hence the tests are done regularly to
see salt content (calcium content), pH, accumulation of waste due to not
changing water for long, etc.
Importance of biochemistry in NUTRITION
In nutrition, biochemistry describes food chemistry. For maintenance of health,
optimum intake of many biochemicals like macro, micronutrients, vitamins,
minerals, essential fatty acids & water is necessary.
1. Food chemistry gives an idea of what we eat, i.e., it’ s components like
carbohydrates, proteins, fats, etc. and also the possible physiological
alteration due to their deficiency.
2. The role of nutrients: Due to biochemistry the importance of vitamins,
minerals, essential fatty acids, their contribution to health were known.
Hence there is a frequent recommendation for inclusion of crucial amino-acids,
cod liver oil, salmon fish oil, etc. by physicians and other health and fitness
experts.
3. The nutrients value of food material can also be determined by biochemical
tests.
4. The physician can prescribe to limit usage of certain food like excess sugar for
diabetics, excess oil for heart & lung problem prone patients, etc. As these
carbohydrate and fat diets can inhibit the recovery rate from said disorder.
This knowledge is due to their idea of food chemistry and related
Importance of biochemistry in PHARMACY
In a pharmacy, many drugs are stored for regular dispensing.
Drug Constitution: Biochemistry gives an idea of the constitution of the
drug, its chances of degradation with varying temperature, etc. How
modification in medicinal chemistry helps improve efficiency, minimize side
effects, etc.
The half-life: This is a test done on biochemical drugs to know how long a
drug is stable when kept at so and so temperature.
Drug storage: The storage condition required can be estimated by the
biochemical test. For example many enzymes, hormones are stored
for dispensing. These get deteriorated over time due to temperature or
oxidation, contamination and also due to improper storage.
Drug metabolism: It also gives an idea of how drug molecules
are metabolized by many biochemical reactions in the presence of enzymes.
This helps to avoid drugs which have a poor metabolism or those with
excessive side effects from being prescribed or dispensed to the patient.
Biochemical tests: These tests help fix the specific half-life or date of expiry
of drugs.
Importance of biochemistry in plants
Biochemistry of plants gave way to the breakthrough of how food is synthesized in
them and the reason why they are autotrophs, i.e., not dependent on other living
beings for food. Biochemistry in plants describes
1. Photosynthesis: This describes how carbohydrates are synthesized by the use of
sunlight, CO2, and water in the green leaves of plants. It goes on to explain about
different complex enzymes involved in the process to combine the energy of sun
within the molecules H2O+ CO2 in the form of carbohydrates.
2. Respiration: By use of the above photosynthesis pathway, plants leave out
Oxygen while taking up Carbon dioxide from the air. This air is used to generate
energy in a cell like that of animal cell
3. Different sugars: Biochemistry defines different types of carbohydrates formed
in plants like trioses (3 carbon sugars, i.e., glyceraldehyde), tetroses (4), pentoses
(5), hexoses (6= glucose), heptoses (7), etc. Tetroses are the carbohydrates which go
on to form the nucleic acids, i.e., deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), ribonucleic acid (RNA).
4. Plants secondary metabolites: Biochemistry also describes how the plant
products like gums, tannins, alkaloids, resins, enzymes, phytohormones are formed
inside the plant. Further, how the different plant cell parts are involved in physiology.
The conversion of different biochemical over some time like lignin, chitin to harden
the dead vascular vessels, etc.
5. Other functions: It also describes how plants fruits get ripened, how to plant
seed germinates, the respiration process inside the plant cell, how proteins
and amino acidsare formed on rough endoplasmic reticulum and fats are formed on
smooth ER.
References: Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry
