Pharmacokinetics of gonadotropin-releasing hormone: comparison of subcutaneous and intravenous routes.

Pulsatile administration of GnRH has been used to stimulate gonadal function in both hypogonadotropic men and women; however, deficient responses were observed with the sc in contrast to the iv route of hormone delivery. To clarify whether this was due to altered bioavailability, we compared the pharmacokinetics of these two routes of GnRH administration by bolus injection and steady state continuous infusion methods. Synthetic GnRH was administered by both sc and iv routes to 14 hypogonadotropic patients (11 women and 3 men) as a bolus (5 micrograms in 25, 100, or 250 microliters, sc, and 250 microliters, iv; n = 6) or by continuous iv or sc infusion (3.17 micrograms/h for 6 h; n = 11). In single dose studies, plasma immunoreactive GnRH (IR-GnRH) peaks were earlier and higher (400 vs. 93.5 pg/ml) and returned to baseline sooner (less than 60 vs. greater than 120 min) after iv than after sc bolus injection. Plasma IR-GnRH levels were lower between 1 and 5 min, but higher between 30-90 min after sc injection compared with iv bolus injection. During the continuous infusions, plateau levels of IR-GnRH between 2 and 6 h were 34% lower with sc delivery (67.5 vs. 102.4 pg/ml), indicating irreversible losses of about one third of GnRH injected sc. In patients undergoing pulsatile GnRH therapy delivered by programmed portable minipumps, plasma IR-GnRH profiles were highly damped after sc administration, but retained an intermittent pulse wave form with the iv route. These data suggest that pharmacokinetic differences in the sc and iv routes of GnRH administration are due to a combination of prolonged and delayed absorption with reduced bioavailability of GnRH via the sc route. The consequent damping of the plasma GnRH profiles with sc administration may contribute to differences in the clinical efficacy of pulsatile GnRH regimens, and specific modifications of pulsatile regimens may be required to adapt the physiological requirements of an intermittent plasma GnRH wave form to the damped and reduced bioavailability of sc GnRH therapy.