Medicines and clinical trials

The verb most likely to trip a reader here is einschleichen, because everyday German knows it almost only as a reflexive. Sich einschleichen is to creep in unnoticed: a burglar slips into a house, and ein Fehler hat sich eingeschlichen, an error has crept in. On a ward and in a prescribing guide the same verb drops its sich and takes a medicine as its object. Ein Präparat einschleichen is to start it at a low dose and raise it step by step, so that the body gets used to it before the full effect is asked of it. Its mirror image is ausschleichen, tapering off at the end of a course. Both are separable, wir schleichen das Mittel langsam ein, and neither has anything furtive about it: what creeps is the dose, and it creeps by design. These pages explain words and give no medical advice.