Mechanistic Models: Overview of Compartment Models

Pharmacokinetic models can be classified as empirical or mechanistic.

Empirical models include data description with minimal assumptions about the analyzed data.

Mechanistic models, like physiological and compartmental models, robustly describe available data by incorporating known system factors surrounding the data.

Compartmental analysis provides mathematical and statistical models defined by integrated, matrix, or partial differential equations to describe drug behavior.

These methods benefit special populations such as pediatric or hepatic impairment patients.

Types of compartmental analyses include individual analysis and population pharmacokinetic modeling. Examples are the naïve pooled data approach, the standard two-stage approach, and nonlinear mixed-effect modeling.

Nonlinear regression is essential for compartmental analyses and depends on equations whose partial derivatives involve other model parameters.

While mechanistic models can't explain the "true" mechanisms underlying drug behavior, they highlight essential mechanistic correlations and provide valuable insights into drug behavior.