This work aimed to investigate the pharmacokinetics of six major blood-entering components(triptolide, triptophenolide, wilforgine, wilforine, tripterine, and wilforlide A) in Tripterygium wilfordii Polyglycosides Tablets(TWPT) between normal rats and the rat model of adjuvant arthritis, which was established by injection of Freund's complete adjuvant. Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry(LC-MS) was employed to determine the content of six main components in the serum samples of normal and arthritic rats after administration of TWPT, and the pharmacokinetics of the six components were compared between normal and model rats. The specificity, linearity, accuracy, precision, stability, extraction recovery and matrix effect of the established LC-MS method all met the requirements. Compared with normal rats, the model rats showed significantly prolonged t_(1/2) and MRT_(0-∞) of wilforgine, significantly shortened t_(1/2) and MRT_(0-∞) of wilforlide A, and no significant changes in the pharmacokinetics of the other four components in vivo. The results indicated that adjuvant arthritis had different effects on the pharmacokinetics of different active components of TWPT in vivo. The findings provide guidance for the rational clinical application of TWPT and the secondary development of related products.
Keywords: Tripterygium wilfordii Polyglycosides Tablets; adjuvant arthritis; pharmacokinetics; wilforgine; wilforlide A.