Pharmacokinetic modelling of the interaction between St John's wort and ciclosporin A.
OBJECTIVE
St John's wort (SJW) decreases the blood concentration of ciclosporin A (CsA), which may result in allograft rejection. In addition, the time course of this interaction is not parallel with the administration of SJW. We aimed to develop a pharmacokinetic model to predict the time profile of blood CsA concentrations during and after the intake of SJW.


METHODS
We developed a pharmacokinetic model incorporating turnover of detoxicating proteins, with the assumption that the amount of detoxicating proteins is in inverse proportion to the ratio of trough blood concentration to daily dose (C/D ratio) of CsA. First, we collected time profiles of blood CsA during and after the intake of SJW from the literature. Next, we analysed the relationship between D/C ratio and the daily dose of SJW at steady state. Subsequently, the developed model was simultaneously fitted to the time profiles of C/D ratios by using a nonlinear least-squares method to obtain model parameters.


RESULTS
The model analysis revealed that the induction of the detoxicating proteins by SJW was saturable with an elimination rate constant of the detoxicating proteins (ke) of 4.72 month(-1). Elimination half-life of the detoxicating proteins calculated from the ke value was 4.4 days, suggesting that the dose of CsA should be carefully monitored for up to 2 weeks after the cessation of SJW intake.


CONCLUSIONS
The present model may provide additional information for use in identifying optimal dosage regimens of CsA during and after the intake of SJW to prevent an adverse drug interaction between CsA and SJW.
Murakami
Yuichi
Y
Department of Medico-Pharmaceutical Sciences, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kyushu University, 3-1-1 Maidashi, Higashi-ku, Fukuoka 812-8582, Japan.
Tanaka
Tomoaki
T
Murakami
Hideyasu
H
Tsujimoto
Masayuki
M
Ohtani
Hisakazu
H
Sawada
Yasufumi
Y
D016572:Cyclosporine / Q000493:pharmacokinetics*; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D005260:Female; D016027:Heart Transplantation; D041743:Herb-Drug Interactions; D006801:Humans; D020902:Hypericum; D007166:Immunosuppressive Agents / Q000493:pharmacokinetics*; D016030:Kidney Transplantation; D016031:Liver Transplantation; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008956:Models, Chemical; D012189:Retrospective Studies
D007166:Immunosuppressive Agents; D016572:Cyclosporine