Plasmodium falciparum Drug Resistance Phenotype as Assessed by Patient Antimalarial Drug Levels and Its Association With pfmdr1 Polymorphisms

By estimating drug concentrations, we were able to quantify the contribution of pfmdr1 single-nucleotide polymorphisms to reduced lumefantrine susceptibility. The method can be applied to all long-half-life antimalarial drugs, enables early detection of P. falciparum with reduced drug susceptibility in vivo, and represents a novel way for unveiling molecular markers of antimalarial drug resistance.