Utilizing postmortem drug concentrations in mechanistic modeling and simulation of cardiac effects: a proof of concept study with methadone

Abstract

Methadone-related poisoning has been found to be the leading and increasing cause of death among intoxication cases in several countries. Aside from respiratory depression, methadone is known to cause QT-prolongation, which may lead to sudden cardiac death. Concentrations in heart tissue should be more accurate for estimating cardiotoxic effects. The aim of this study was to investigate whether the effect of methadone on the QT-interval could be simulated and whether the concentrations in heart tissues allowed for better prediction of the Bazett corrected QT-interval (QTcB). A predictive performance study was conducted using the simulation platform Cardiac Safety Simulator to mimic five literature studies using their described study conditions. Both free and total plasma and heart concentrations were investigated using two different in silico models: the O’Hara-Rudy (ORD) model and the 10 Tusscher (TNNP) model. The results showed that the QTcB of methadone was best predicted either with total plasma using the TNNP model or with free plasma using the ORD model. The ORD model was highly sensitive to the total heart concentrations, resulting in overprediction of the QTcB. The TNNP model also overpredicted the QTcB, but to a lesser degree than the ORD model. Furthermore, due to a low baseline QTcB, the ORD model underpredicted the QTcB for both the free plasma and free heart concentrations. In conclusion, it is possible to simulate the cardiac effects of methadone, yet several elements influence the approach uncertainty including but not limited to biophysically details model of cardiac electrophysiology, exposure data, and input parameters.

Keywords:

• Methadone
• simulation
• QT-prolongation
• cardiac safety simulator
• Simcyp

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge Natasia Bech Nielsen for her help with free fraction determinations.

Disclosure statement

S.P. is an employee of Certara UK, Simcyp Division. No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Faculty of Health at Aarhus University and by the SURVIVE study, which was funded by the Danish governmental pool for the social area ‘Satspuljen’.