Development and validation of a liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry method for the determination of phenylephrine in human plasma and its application to a pharmacokinetic study

A sensitive and reliable method was developed to quantitate phenylephrine in human plasma using liquid chromatography–electrospray tandem mass spectrometry. The assay was based on solid-phase extraction with C18 cartridges and hydrophilic interaction chromatography performed on a pentafluorophenylpropylsilica column (50 mm × 4 mm, 3 μm particles), the mobile phase consisted of methanol–10 mM ammonium acetate (90:10, v/v). Quantification was through positive-ion mode and selected reaction monitoring at m/z 168.1 → 135.0 for phenylephrine and m/z 182.1 → 135.0 for internal standard etilefrin, respectively. The lower limit of quantitation was 51 pg/ml using 0.25 ml of plasma and linearity was observed from 51 to 5500 pg/ml. Within-day and between-day precision expressed by relative standard deviation was less than 12% and inaccuracy did not exceed 8% at all levels. The assay was applied to the analysis of samples from a pharmacokinetic study.