Simultaneous determination of magnesium lithospermate B, rosmarinic acid, and lithospermic acid in beagle dog serum by liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry.

A rapid, sensitive and specific isocratic liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS/MS) method was developed for the simultaneous quantitative determination of magnesium lithospermate B (MLB), rosmarinic acid (RA), and lithospermic acid (LA) in beagle dog serum, with silibinin as internal standard. The serum samples were treated by liquid-liquid extraction and analyzed using LC/MS/MS with a TurboIonSpray source. A short run-time (3 min) fulfilled the need for monitoring serum levels of MLB, RA, and LA in large-scale studies. The calibration curves for MLB, RA, and LA were linear over the ranges 8-2048, 4-1024, and 4-1024 ng/mL, respectively, with coefficients of correlation >0.999. The intra- and inter-day precision (CV) of analysis was <10%, and accuracy ranged from 90-104%. This quantitation method was successfully applied to a pharmacokinetic study of salvianolate administrated by intravenous infusion with dosage of 6 mg/kg in beagle dogs.