Determination of the quaternary ammonium compound trospium in human plasma by LC–MS/MS: Application to a pharmacokinetic study

A highly sensitive, specific and evaporation free SPE extraction, LC–MS/MS method has been developed for the estimation of trospium in human plasma using trospium-d8 as an internal standard (IS). The analyte was separated using isocratic mobile phase on reverse phase column and analyzed by MS/MS in the multiple reaction monitoring mode using the respective [M+] cations, m/z 392–164 for trospium and m/z 400–172 for the IS. The total run time was 3.50 min and the elution of trospium and trospium-d8 (IS) occurred at 2.8 min. The developed method was validated in human plasma with a lower limit of quantification of 0.05 ng/mL. A linear response function was established for the range of concentrations 0.05–10 ng/mL (r > 0.998) for trospium in human plasma. The intra- and inter-day precision values for trospium met the acceptance as per FDA guidelines. Trospium was stable in the battery of stability studies viz., bench-top, auto-sampler, dry extracts and freeze/thaw cycles. The developed assay method was applied to an oral pharmacokinetic study in humans.