Spectrochemical elemental analysis of pharmaceuticals and raw materials used for their production will be in the nearest future an obligatory part of quality and safety control for compliance withnew standards announced by the International Council for Harmonization of Technical Requirements for Registration of Pharmaceuticals for Human Use (ICH Q3D). The present paper surveys R&Darticles and scientific papers devoted to determination of the elemental impurities by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry and mass spectrometry (ICP-OES and ICP-MS) in differentpharmaceuticals products that have been published since 2000. In reference to recent changes described in the United States Pharmacopoeia (USP) general chapters <232> and <233>, differentaspects of such measurements are presented, including appropriate sample preparation procedures, possible interferences and means of their avoidance, suitable calibration strategies and validationparameters that have to be assessed to prove reliability of the analytical results on the elemental impurities in pharmaceutical products.