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Updated: May 27, 2026

Basic Research in Plasma Medicine - A Throughput Approach from Liquids to Cells
Published on: November 17, 2017
Plasma terminal half-life
P L Toutain1, A Bousquet-Mélou
1UMR 181 Physiopathologie et Toxicologie Expérimentales INRA/ENVT, Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire de Toulouse, Toulouse cedex 03, France. pl.toutain@envt.fr
Abstract:
Terminal plasma half-life is the time required to divide the plasma concentration by two after reaching pseudo-equilibrium, and not the time required to eliminate half the administered dose. When the process of absorption is not a limiting factor, half-life is a hybrid parameter controlled by plasma clearance and extent of distribution. In contrast, when the process of absorption is a limiting factor, the terminal half-life reflects rate and extent of absorption and not the elimination process (flip-flop pharmacokinetics). The terminal half-life is especially relevant to multiple dosing regimens, because it controls the degree of drug accumulation, concentration fluctuations and the time taken to reach equilibrium.
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