Application of On-line Electrochemistry/Electrospray/Tandem Mass Spectrometry to a Quantification Method for the Antipsychotic Drug Zotepine in Human Serum

A simple, rapid, and sensitive on-line liquid chromatographic electrochemistry/electrospray/tandem mass spectrometry (LC-EC/ESI-MS/MS) method for the determination of zotepine in human serum was developed using a new generated-electrochemically fragment ion, and was validated. A recent novel technique of LC-EC/ESI-MS/MS that combines LC-MS/MS and the on-line EC reaction is potentially applicable to developing a quantification method for drugs in biological samples. Newly formed products generated by the on-line EC cell are expected to provide appropriate precursor and product ions for the MS/MS determination method. This technique was successfully applied to a drug assay in a biological matrix. After adding imipramine (IS) to a 30-μL aliquot of human serum, the resulting sample was simply deproteinated with acetonitrile for a measurement. The analytical run time was 5 min. The calibration curve was linear in the concentration range of 10 − 2000 ng/mL. The intra-assay precision and accuracy were in the range of 1.8 − 8.9 and 98.4 − 113%, respectively.