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Efficacy is the ability to perform a task to a satisfactory or expected degree. The word comes from the same roots as effectiveness, and it has often been used synonymously, although in pharmacology a distinction is now often made between efficacy and effectiveness.[1]
The word efficacy is used in pharmacology and medicine to refer both to the maximum response achievable from a pharmaceutical drug in research settings,[2] and to the capacity for sufficient therapeutic effect or beneficial change in clinical settings.
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