Isolation and identification of a new major metabolite of diflunisal in man. The sulfate conjugate.

A new metabolite of diflunisal has been identified in volunteers and patients after multiple dose administration. The metabolite was isolated from human urine by silica gel chromatography and was further purified by reversed phase HPLC. Arylsulfatase from Helix pomatia and from Aerobacter aerogenes completely hydrolyzed the isolated metabolite to diflunisal, although hydrolysis by bacterial arylsulfatase was extremely slow. Electron impact mass spectra for diflunisal and its sulfate conjugate were virtually identical. Negative ion fast atom bombardment mass spectra clearly showed the quasimolecular ion [M-H]- at m/z 329 (base peak) as well as a large fragment ion (90% relative intensity) at m/z 249 corresponding to the loss of the sulfate moiety. Urinary excretion patterns in volunteers and rheumatoid arthritis patients revealed that sulfate conjugation of diflunisal is a minor metabolic pathway after single 500-mg dose administration (less than 10% of the dose), whereas it becomes a major pathway (21.3-44.3% of the dose) following multiple doses (500 mg b.i.d.). In one volunteer, who ingested 500 mg diflunisal b.i.d. for 5 weeks, it was shown that the percentage of the dose excreted as diflunisal sulfate gradually increased during the first week to approximately 30% and stayed virtually unchanged for the remaining 4 weeks of diflunisal intake. These preliminary observations are not compatible with the idea that sulfate conjugation is capacity-limited at lower substrate concentrations than glucuronide conjugation, nor do they suggest that sulfation of diflunisal is rate-limited by depletion of inorganic sulfate body stores.