What Is a Pharmacokinetic Model?

Pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamics (PK/PD) modeling, an integral component of the drug development process, is a mathematical technique for predicting the effect and efficacy of drug dosing over time. Broadly speaking, pharmacokinetic models describe how the body reacts to a drug in terms of absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion. Pharmacodynamic models describe how a drug affects the body by linking the drug concentration to an efficacy (or safety) metric. A well-characterized PK/PD model is an important tool in guiding the design of future experiments and trials.

The PK/PD modeling process includes the following steps:

• Import, process, and visualize time-course data
• Select a pharmacokinetic model from a library, or create mechanism-based PK/PD models using the interactive block-diagram editor
• Estimate model parameters using nonlinear regression or NLME methods
• Explore system dynamics, using parameter sweeps and sensitivity analysis
• Simulate dosing strategies and what-if scenarios

To learn more about PK/PD modeling, see SimBiology^®.