Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B (Oct 2014)

Simultaneous determination of nineteen major components in Qi She Pill by ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry

  • Zhongliang Zhang,
  • Qiang Li,
  • Qiufen Li,
  • Simiao Du,
  • Yongquan Zhou,
  • Chunming Lv,
  • Yan Zhao,
  • Yongjun Wang,
  • Ning Zhang

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsb.2014.05.003
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 4, no. 5
pp. 384 – 393

Abstract

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Qi She Pill (QSP) is a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) prescription that has been used in treating cervical spondylosis radiculopathy for many years. In this study, a simple and sensitive method using ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC–MS/MS) on a reverse-phase C18 column was developed for the simultaneous determination of the 19 major components in QSP. We found that the optimum mobile phase for gradient elution was 0.1% formic acid and methanol. The correlation coefficients of all calibration curves were greater than 0.99. Recoveries measured at three concentration levels varied from 95.43% to 102.35%. Relative standard deviations of intra- and inter-day precisions were less than 4.45%. After successfully validating our method, we then applied it to the quantification of 19 components in QSP products to show that this method provides a new standard in quality assessment of TCM prescriptions containing multiple bioactive components.

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