[Pharmacokinetic study of aclarubicin. The pharmacokinetics of the preparation and its biologically active metabolites in the blood of rats].

Blood pharmacokinetics of the antitumor antibiotic aclarubicin and its metabolites was studied in rats with high performance liquid chromatography. The drug was administered intravenously in single doses of 5 and 10 mg/kg and orally in a single dose of 10 mg/kg. Aclarubicin pharmacokinetics was shown to be nonlinear. However, within every dose level it obeyed a two-compartment model. The nonlinearity could be due to saturation of aclarubicin binding to blood plasma proteins. The blood concentrations of metabolites MA144 N1 and MA144 T1 were close and after 12-18 hours exceeded those of unchanged aclarubicin. The half-lives of aclarubicin and its metabolites ranged from 16 to 21 hours. The MA144 T1 content was not significant. Following oral administration aclarubicin was rapidly absorbed and its bioavailability amounted to 35 per cent. Total bioavailability of aclarubicin, MA144 N1 and MA144 T1 was equal to 89 per cent. This enabled to consider the oral route of aclarubicin administration promising in tumor therapy.