Preliminary studies on the distribution and fate of TEM, TEPA, and myleran in the human.

Abstract

]~IORESHWAR V. NADKARNI,~ EBERHARD G. TRAMS,~ AND PAUL K. SMITH (Department of Pharmacology, George Washington University School of Medicine, Washington, D.C.) The clinical use of alkylating drugs represents an important contribution toward the chemo- therapeutic management of certain forms of hu- man cancer. Several recent reports summarize the palliative responses obtained with triethyl- enemelamine (TEM), triethylene phosphoramide (TEPA), and Myleran (Busulfan) in patients with malignant neoplasias of lymphatic or myelogenous origin (2, 3, 11, 12). The clinician is interested physicochemical methods for the analysis of these drugs or their probable metabolites are inadequate to detect such minute amounts as are present under pharmacologic experimentation in mam- mals. Therefore, radioisotopic tracer technics were employed in the present experiments. The mo- lecular structures of the drugs studied and the type of the isotopic label employed are shown in Chart 1.