Evaluation of drug-metabolizing enzyme hydroxylation phenotypes in Hispanic populations: The CEIBA cocktail

Interindividual differences in response to drug treatments are mainly caused by differences in drug metabolism, in which cytochrome P450 (CYP450) enzymes are involved. Genetic polymorphisms of these enzymes have a key role in this variability. However, environmental factors, endogenous metabolism and disease states also have a great influence on the actual drug metabolism rate (metabolic phenotype). Consequently, the genotype does not always correlate with the actual drug hydroxylation phenotype. In this sense, in vivo phenotyping strategies represent an alternative to evaluate the interindividual variability in drug metabolism. Therefore, the 'cocktail' approach is considered as an advantageous strategy to obtain actual and reliable information on several CYP activities in just one experiment. As reviewed, phenotyping studies on Latin-American populations, which comprise about 400 million people, are scarce, and only selective phenotyping methods were applied. Therefore, a novel cocktail approach is here proposed as a phenotyping tool to evaluate the relationship between genotype and phenotype of major CYP enzymes in Hispanic populations. This determination will allow adaptation of drug therapies to these populations and consequently to benefit from the application of pharmacogenetics in the reduction of drug adverse effects and in the improvement of therapeutic responses.