Influence of albuminemia on the pharmacokinetics of infliximab in patients with inflammatory bowel diseases
Abstract
Purpose of the study: To analyse infliximab and albumin serum levels in different stages of the biological treatment of patients with inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD). Methods: We examined the serum trough levels of infliximab and albuminemia in 85 patients with IBD in weeks 2 and 14 of biological treatment with infliximab.
Results: In week 2, infliximab was detected in the sera of 34 patients (40%) and in week 14 in 44 patients (52%). Serum infliximab trough levels were significantly lower in week 2 than in week 14 (p = 0.0138).
Likewise, levels of albumin in week 2 were significantly lower than in week 14 (p = 0.0002). In patients with detectable serum infliximab trough levels (concentration > 3 µg/ml), albuminemia was significantly higher than in patients with undetectable serum infliximab levels, regardless of the biological treatment stage.
The correlation between serum infliximab levels and albuminemia was significantly positive (r = 0.39, p < 0.0001). Conclusions: Levels of both infliximab and albumin rise during biological treatment of IBD.
We confirmed a significant positive correlation between albumin and infliximab serum levels, suggesting the theoretical possibility of using serum albumin to predict infliximab pharmacokinetics.