Carbamazepine Clearance in Paediatric Epilepsy Patients: Influence of Body Mass, Dose, Sex and Co-Medication

Carbamazepine clearance was studied in Black paediatric epilepsy patients, 90 receiving monotherapy and 17 on combination therapy. For patients on monotherapy the following relationships are shown: clearance decreases with increasing body mass (r = 0.87); clearance increases with increasing dose (r = 0.70); and mean clearances for males are higher than those for females throughout the mass ranges, though the difference is not statistically significant. In the case of patients on carbamazepine plus another anticonvulsant, clearance also decreases with increasing body mass, and increases with increasing dose. Furthermore, in the mass groups which corresponded with those on monotherapy, mean carbamazepine clearance is higher by a factor varying from 1.3 to 1.7; in the corresponding dosage groups, it is higher by a factor of between 1.4 and 1.7.