An estimation method of the half-life for a one-compartment model of a single bolus intravenous injection by a single sampling

In clinical trials, sometimes only a single drug concentration can be measured from a patient because of the patient's burden. In this case, the sampling point is usually identical for all patients. From a single concentration, we cannot generally obtain point-estimates of each pharmacokinetic parameter. In this paper, we propose a method to estimate the half-life of a one-compartment model of a single bolus intravenous injection from a single concentration at a sampling point of or after three half-lives. We analytically show that the later the sampling point is the better estimate of the half-life we can get. This approach is illustrated by simulated concentration-data and nicorandil concentration-data. Therefore, we compared the performance of the proposed method with that of the Bayesian approach.