V: Various
ATC group V is the catch-all letter of the classification [1].
| Description | In plain terms | Example drug | |
|---|---|---|---|
| V01 | Allergens | extracts for allergy testing and desensitization | Grass pollen allergen extract (V01AA02) / house dust mite allergen extract (V01AA03) |
| V03 | All other therapeutic products | catch-all: antidotes, chelators, medical gases | Naloxone (V03AB15) / acetylcysteine (V03AB23) |
| V04 | Diagnostic agents | Tuberculin (V04CF01) / 13C-urea (V04CX05) | |
| V06 | General nutrients | No substance to name: enteral and parenteral nutrition products are classified at group level only (V06A, V06B, V06C, V06DA, V06DB, V06DD, V06DE, V06DF, V06DX carry no level 5 substances). The only level 5 entries in the whole group are glucose (V06DC01) and fructose (V06DC02). | |
| V07 | All other non-therapeutic products | non-medicines: dressings, solvents, disinfectants, cosmetics | No substance to name, and no level 5 codes anywhere in the group: every subgroup stops at level 4, e.g. solvents and diluting agents (V07AB), blood transfusion auxiliary products (V07AC), technical disinfectants (V07AV). |
| V08 | Contrast media | injected agents that make scans visible | Iohexol (V08AB02) / gadobutrol (V08CA09) |
| V09 | Diagnostic radiopharmaceuticals | radioactive tracers injected to image the body | Fludeoxyglucose (18F) (V09IX04) / technetium (99mTc) medronic acid (V09BA02) |
| V10 | Therapeutic radiopharmaceuticals | radioactive drugs given to treat disease | Sodium iodide (131I) (V10XA01) / lutetium (177Lu) vipivotide tetraxetan (V10XX05) |
| V20 | Surgical dressings | No substance to name: V20 has no subdivisions at all. The classification stops at the level 2 group code V20 (surgical dressings), with no level 3, 4 or 5 entries. |
Radiopharmaceuticals for imaging and therapy
Almost all radionuclides used in radiopharmaceutical therapy (V10) also emit photons that can be imaged, so the biodistribution of the therapeutic agent can be seen without invasive sampling. The activity seen on these images falls by radioactive decay as well as by biological clearance, and the effective clearance rate is the sum of the physical decay rate and the biological clearance rate [2]. In one study of 65 patients with metastatic hormone-resistant (castration-resistant) prostate cancer treated with lutetium (177Lu) vipivotide tetraxetan (V10XX05), lesion uptake on the baseline diagnostic positron emission tomography (PET) scan with gallium (68Ga) gozetotide (V09IX14), also written 68Ga-PSMA-11, correlated strongly with uptake on post-treatment SPECT (Pearson r 0.74 across 1364 lesions) [3]. How the images are turned into absorbed doses is covered under V10.