Population pharmacokinetics of artesunate and dihydroartemisinin during long-term oral administration of artesunate to patients with metastatic breast cancer.

CONCLUSIONS: Population pharmacokinetics of ARS and DHA in patients with breast cancer was well described by a combined drug-metabolite model without any covariates and with an increase in apparent elimination clearance of DHA over time. The estimated DHA saliva/plasma ratio was in good agreement with the reported DHA unbound fraction in human plasma. Saliva ARS concentrations correlated poorly with plasma concentrations. This suggests the use of saliva sampling for therapeutic drug monitoring of DHA. However, further studies are warranted to investigate the robustness of this approach. PMID: 25248945 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Clinical Breast Cancer - Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Tags: Eur J Clin Pharmacol Source Type: research