A Rapid and Sensitive Method for the Determination of Bisoprolol in Human Plasma by Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography–Tandem Mass Spectrometry

A rapid and sensitive ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS) method for the determination of bisoprolol in human plasma was established and validated. The sample was pretreated by methanol precipitation protein, and the isotope bisoprolol-d₅ was used as the internal standard. The chromatographic column was ACQUITY UPLC BEH-C₁₈ column (2.1 × 50 mm, 1.7 μm), with methanol and 0.2% formic acid aqueous solution as mobile phase for gradient elution. The electrospray ionization (ESI) source was used in the positive ion mode, and the multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode was used. The total running time was only 2.00 min. The correlation coefficient was good (r > 0.99) in the linear range of 0.0200-40.0 ng/mL. The lower limit of quantitation (LLOQ) was 20.0 pg/mL. The intrabatch and interbatch precisions were not more than 8.9% and 9.2%. The intrabatch and interbatch accuracies were -7.9% ~ 6.3% and -6.9% ~ 5.0%. The method was fully validated including whole blood stability and reinjection reproducibility and successfully applied to the pharmacokinetic study of 5-mg bisoprolol in healthy volunteers, which 93.1% incurred samples reanalysis (ISR) met the criteria. Compared with the reported methods, this method had the highest sensitivity and fast analysis speed.