Question

A chemical undergoes enterohepatic circulation. How might that affect the half-life of the chemical?

Definition of half-life according to The American Heritage Medical Dictionary: The time required for half the quantity of a drug or other substance deposited in a living organism to be metabolized or eliminated by normal biological processes.

Answer 1

As per the context of the The American Heritage Medical Dictionary Half life or t1/2 is the time required for the half quantity of a drug or any other substance deposited in a living organism to be metabolized or eliminated by normal biological processes.

hence if the resident time of the drug is more in the biological system then its t1/2 increases.

Any chemical or the drug substance if secreted in bile and further is reabsorbed from the intestine & then returns to the liver and appears again in the bile then its the process of the enterohepatic circulation.

Furthermore enterohepatic circulation occurs by biliary excretion as well as intestinal reabsorption of a a drug or chemical through the hepatic conjugation followed by the intestinal deconjugation. This results in the increase of the apparent half-life ofthe drug or chemical.