Clinical pharmacokinetics of oxcarbazepine

Oxcarbazepine is an antiepileptic drug with a chemical structure similar to carbamazepine, but with different metabolism. Oxcarbazepine is rapidly reduced to 10, 11-dihydro-10-hydroxy-carbazepine (monohydroxy derivative, MHD), the clinically relevant metabolite of oxcarbazepine. MHD has (S)-(+)- and the (R)-(−)-enantiomer, but the pharmacokinetics of the racemate are usually reported.