High-performance liquid chromatographic methods for the determination of topoisomerase II inhibitors

Handling unstable analytes: literature review and expert panel survey by Japan Bioanalysis Forum Discussion Group

Analyzing unstable small molecule drugs and metabolites in blood continues to be challenging for bioanalysis. Although scientific countermeasures such as immediate cooling, immediate freezing, addition of enzyme inhibitors, pH adjustment, dried blood spot or derivatization have been developed, selecting the best practices has become an issue in the pharmaceutical industry as the number of drugs with such problems is increasing, even for generic drugs. In this study, we conducted a comprehensive literature review and a questionnaire survey to determine a suitable practice for evaluating instability and implementing countermeasures. Three areas of focus, matrix selection, effect of hemolysis and selection of esterase inhibitors, are discussed.

Quantification of DOX bioavailability in biological samples of mice by sensitive and precise HPLC assay

CONTEXT

Doxorubicin (DOX)-loaded folate-targeted poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyoctanoate) [P(HB-HO)] nanoparticles [DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs] were prepared by the W1/O/W2 solvent extraction/evaporation method for applications in cancer treatment. However, the biodistribution, pharmacokinetics, and targeting of the nanoparticles (NPs) have not yet been studied.

OBJECTIVE

The biodistribution, pharmacokinetics, and targeting of DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs were evaluated in female BALB/c nude mice bearing HeLa tumors.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Three DOX formulations were injected into the tail vein of the mice at a dosage of 5 mg/kg. At each time point, blood and various tissues were collected. All samples were then processed and analyzed by a validated high performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method.

RESULTS

The t1/2 values of DOX/P(HB-HO) NPs and DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs were 2.7- and 3.5-times higher than that of free DOX. No significant difference (p > 0.05) was found in Cmax between the NPs and free DOX. The Tmax values of the two NPs were prolonged from 0.25 to 1 h. The AUC0-t values were 1.55- and 3.05-folds higher than that of free DOX, and MRT increased to 15.99 h for DOX/P(HB-HO) NPs and 25.14 h for DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs. For DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs, the DOX content in the tumors were 10.81- and 3.33-times higher than those for free DOX and DOX/P(HB-HO) NPs at 48 h, respectively.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

DOX/FA-PEG-P(HB-HO) NPs displayed reduced cardiac toxicity and improved bioavailability. Moreover, the NPs exhibited a significant extent of DOX accumulation in the tumors, thus suggesting that folate-targeted NPs could effectively transport into HeLa tumors with satisfying targeting.

Nanotherapeutics With Anthracyclines: Methods of Determination and Quantification of Anthracyclines in Biological Samples

Anthracyclines, e.g. doxorubicin, pirarubicin, are widely used as cytostatic agents in the polymer nanotherapeutics designed for the highly effective antitumor therapy with reduced side effects. However, their precise dosage scheme needs to be optimized, which requires an accurate method for their quantification on the cellular level in vitro during nanocarrier development and in body fluids and tissues during testing in vivo. Various methods detecting the anthracycline content in biological samples have already been designed. Most of them are highly demanding and they differ in exactness and reproducibility. The cellular uptake and localization is predominantly observed and determined by microscopy techniques, the anthracycline content is usually quantified by chromatographic analysis using fluorescence detection. We reviewed and compared published methods concerning the detection of anthracycline nanocarriers.

Total synchronous fluorescence spectroscopic data modeled with first- and second-order algorithms for the determination of doxorubicin in human plasma

In this work, we present the development of a method for the determination of doxorubicin in plasma samples in the presence of an unexpected component (riboflavin) by using total synchronous fluorescence spectroscopic data matrices. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that the second-order advantage is obtained with this kind of data. Two strategies including unfolding the data and: (a) processing with multivariate curve resolution coupled to alternating least-squares as first-order data or (b) processing with unfolded partial least-squares and exploiting the second-order advantage by the residual bilinearization procedure were considered. The calibration set was built with human plasma samples spiked with doxorubicin, while the validation set was prepared with human plasma samples spiked with both doxorubicin and riboflavin, a drug whose spectrum highly overlaps with the one corresponding to doxorubicin. Both methodologies reached good indicators of accuracy: recoveries of ca. 100 ± 8% and REP of ca. 5%; and precision: coefficient of variations between 7 and 9%.

Analysis of anticancer drugs: a review

In the last decades, the number of patients receiving chemotherapy has considerably increased. Given the toxicity of cytotoxic agents to humans (not only for patients but also for healthcare professionals), the development of reliable analytical methods to analyse these compounds became necessary. From the discovery of new substances to patient administration, all pharmaceutical fields are concerned with the analysis of cytotoxic drugs. In this review, the use of methods to analyse cytotoxic agents in various matrices, such as pharmaceutical formulations and biological and environmental samples, is discussed. Thus, an overview of reported analytical methods for the determination of the most commonly used anticancer drugs is given.

Quantitative liquid chromatographic analysis of anthracyclines in biological fluids

Anthracyclines are amongst the most widely used drugs in oncology, being part of the treatment regimen in most patients receiving systemic chemotherapy. This review provides a comprehensive summary of the sample preparation techniques and chromatographic methods that have been developed during the last two decades for the analysis of the 4 most administered anthracyclines, doxorubicin, epirubicin, daunorubicin and idarubicin in plasma, serum, saliva or urine, within the context of clinical and pharmacokinetic studies or for assessing occupational exposure. Following deproteinization, liquid-liquid extraction, solid phase extraction or a combination of these techniques, the vast majority of methods utilizes reversed-phase C18 stationary phases for liquid chromatographic separation, followed by fluorescence detection, or, more recently, tandem mass spectrometric detection. Some pros and cons of the different techniques are addressed, in addition to potential pitfalls that may be encountered in the analysis of this class of compounds.

High performance liquid chromatographic determination of some co-administered anticancer drugs in pharmaceutical preparations and in spiked human plasma

Two HPLC methods are introduced in this paper for the simultaneous determination of doxorubicin hydrochloride (DOX) and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), combination I, and of cytarabine (CYT) and etoposide (ETO), combination II, as co-administered drugs. In both combinations, a [250 mm x 4.6 mm C-18 column is used. The mobile phase for combination I consists of a mixture of acetonitrile and 0.05 M disodium hydrogenphosphate (50:50, v/v) containing 0.1% sodium laurylsulfate (SLS) adjusted to pH 3.7 at a flow rate 1 ml/min, with UV detection at 260 nm and ambient temperature. For combination II, the mobile phase consists of a mixture of 0.02 M sodium dihydrogenphosphate aqueous solution adjusted to pH 6.0 (with 0.2 M orthophosphoric acid or sodium hydroxide) and acetonitrile in a ratio of (7:3) at a flow rate 1 ml/min, with UV detection at 254 nm and ambient temperature. The methods also permitted the determination of methyl hydroxybenzoate (MHB) which is used as a preservative in DOX vials, combination I, and of benzyl alcohol (BZA) preservative in ETO vials, combination II. The proposed HPLC methods were successfully applied to the determination of the investigated drugs, of the two combinations, both in injection solutions and spiked human plasma samples with high precision and accuracy. Linearity, validation, accuracy, precision, limits of detection, limits of quantitation, and other aspects of analytical validation are presented in the text.

A validated assay for measuring doxorubicin in biological fluids and tissues in an isolated lung perfusion model: matrix effect and heparin interference strongly influence doxorubicin measurements

Doxorubicin is an antineoplasic agent active against sarcoma pulmonary metastasis, but its clinical use is hampered by its myelotoxicity and its cumulative cardiotoxicity, when administered systemically. This limitation may be circumvented using the isolated lung perfusion (ILP) approach, wherein a therapeutic agent is infused locoregionally after vascular isolation of the lung. The influence of the mode of infusion (anterograde (AG): through the pulmonary artery (PA); retrograde (RG): through the pulmonary vein (PV)) on doxorubicin pharmacokinetics and lung distribution was unknown. Therefore, a simple, rapid and sensitive high-performance liquid chromatography method has been developed to quantify doxorubicin in four different biological matrices (infusion effluent, serum, tissues with low or high levels of doxorubicin). The related compound daunorubicin was used as internal standard (I.S.). Following a single-step protein precipitation of 500 microl samples with 250 microl acetone and 50 microl zinc sulfate 70% aqueous solution, the obtained supernatant was evaporated to dryness at 60 degrees C for exactly 45 min under a stream of nitrogen and the solid residue was solubilized in 200 microl of purified water. A 100 microl-volume was subjected to HPLC analysis onto a Nucleosil 100-5 microm C18 AB column equipped with a guard column (Nucleosil 100-5 microm C(6)H(5) (phenyl) end-capped) using a gradient elution of acetonitrile and 1-heptanesulfonic acid 0.2% pH 4: 15/85 at 0 min-->50/50 at 20 min-->100/0 at 22 min-->15/85 at 24 min-->15/85 at 26 min, delivered at 1 ml/min. The analytes were detected by fluorescence detection with excitation and emission wavelength set at 480 and 550 nm, respectively. The calibration curves were linear over the range of 2-1000 ng/ml for effluent and plasma matrices, and 0.1 microg/g-750 microg/g for tissues matrices. The method is precise with inter-day and intra-day relative standard deviation within 0.5 and 6.7% and accurate with inter-day and intra-day deviations between -5.4 and +7.7%. The in vitro stability in all matrices and in processed samples has been studied at -80 degrees C for 1 month, and at 4 degrees C for 48 h, respectively. During initial studies, heparin used as anticoagulant was found to profoundly influence the measurements of doxorubicin in effluents collected from animals under ILP. Moreover, the strong matrix effect observed with tissues samples indicate that it is mandatory to prepare doxorubicin calibration standard samples in biological matrices which would reflect at best the composition of samples to be analyzed. This method was successfully applied in animal studies for the analysis of effluent, serum and tissue samples collected from pigs and rats undergoing ILP.