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Acetaminophen Theory

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Description of Disease and Underlying theory
Acetaminophen, once ingested into the body is rapidly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract into the blood stream where it reaches peak plasma concentration in as little as half an hour. Here, it circulates around the body for a period of up to 4 hours during which it produces its analgesic and antipyretic effects before the acetaminophen is metabolised and deactivated by the liver by a possible 3 pathways: Glucuronidation, sulfation and oxidation (Show below in Figure 2). The most commonly used pathway is the glucuronidation metabolism, closely followed by the sulfation pathway. These methods of metabolism deactivate the acetaminophen in the hepatocytes into non-toxic conjugated sulphate and glucuronide which are excreted in the urine [23] [24]. The majority of the initially ingested therapeutic dosage is metabolised this way, with the remaining acetaminophen being metabolised via the third hepatic cytochrome P45 oxidase pathway, primarily by the enzyme CYP2E1 [25]. When acetaminophen is metabolised via this method, a small amount of a highly reactive toxic intermediate …show more content…

This is rapidly removed by the liver, by reacting with glutathione stored in the hepatocytes, conjugating the NAPQI into non-toxic cysteine and

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