Metabolic and toxic behaviours of phthalimide derivatives in albino rat II. Placental passage of chloromethyl phthalimide, oxymethyl phthalimide and phthalimide--their fetal metabolism.

Chloromethyl phthalimide, oxymethyl phthalimide, and phthalimide are absorbed by the albino rat at a comparatively high rate. Only phthalimide, the metabolic product, will be recordable from fetuses, following oral administration of chloromethyl phthalimide and oxymethyl phthalimide topregnant rats. Those findings, in conjunction with metabolic studies applied to fetuses isolated by caesarian section, appear to suggest the occurrence of an intensive metabolism in fetal tissue. Certain differences established between results of thin-layer chromatography, on the one hand, and 15N studies, on the other, are likely to support the assumption that phthalimide is further metabolised by splitting the imide ring yielding phthalamic acid.