Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research (Jun 2024)

Clinical feasibility of a label-free SERS assay for therapeutic drug monitoring of methotrexate

  • Elodie Dumont,
  • Gohar Soufi,
  • Yaman Göksel,
  • Roman Slipets,
  • Raheel Altaf Raja,
  • Kjeld Schmiegelow,
  • Kinga Zor,
  • Anja Boisen

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 44
p. 100649

Abstract

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We present a therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) feasibility study using a label-free surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS)-based assay for quantifying methotrexate (MTX) from samples collected from children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia undergoing high-dose MTX therapy. We show that, when combined with an appropriate sample preparation (solid phase extraction) and multivariate data analysis (partial least squares regression), the SERS assay demonstrated a good correlation with a reference chromatographic method (r = 0.889, p < 0.005). We also found that the SERS-based approach underestimated MTX concentration, with a 10% bias calculated, but both methods showed similar variability (RSD of 8.4% for HPLC and 11.6% for SERS). The presented results are strong evidence that SERS can be used for TDM of MTX, and this work brings us one step closer to implementing a SERS-based assay in clinics.

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