Increased urinary losses of carnitine during ifosfamide chemotherapy (original) (raw)

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Abstract

Chloroacetaldehyde and thiodiglycolic acid, two metabolites of ifosfamide, interfere with mitochondrial function and may sequester carnitine. Urinary excretion of carnitine was measured in five patients before and during a continuous infusion of ifosfamide over 5 days at a dose of 2.8–3.2 g/m2 per day. The excretion of free and total carnitine increased from 85 ± 53 to 2697 ± 1393 μmol/day on the 1st day of chemotherapy and then gradually decreased. The average loss of carnitine during a chemotherapy cycle amounted to 8.5 mmol. The formation and excretion of esters of carnitine and metabolites of ifosfamide and/or a decreased renal tubular reabsorption could account for this marked loss, which might lead to symptomatic carnitine deficiency after several chemotherapy cycles.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Clinical Pharmacology, University of Bern, Murtenstrasse 35, CH-3010 Bern, Switzerland Tel.: +41-31 632 35 69; Fax: +41-031 632 49 97 E-mail: Blauterburg@ikp.unibe.ch, , , , , , CH
    Niklaus P. Marthaler, Theresa Visarius, Adrian Küpfer & Bernhard H. Lauterburg

Authors

  1. Niklaus P. Marthaler
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  2. Theresa Visarius
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  3. Adrian Küpfer
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  4. Bernhard H. Lauterburg
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Received: 26 October 1998 / Accepted: 5 January 1999

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Marthaler, N., Visarius, T., Küpfer, A. et al. Increased urinary losses of carnitine during ifosfamide chemotherapy.Cancer Chemother Pharmacol 44, 170–172 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1007/s002800050963

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