Novel LC–MS/MS method for analysis of metformin and canagliflozin in human plasma: application to a pharmacokinetic study

Highly sensitive and selective liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) method was developed and validated for the simultaneous estimation of the recently approved oral hypoglycemic mixture; metformin (MET) and canagliflozin (CFZ) in human plasma using propranolol HCl (PPL) and tadalafil (TDF) as internal standards (IS), respectively. Analytes were extracted using protein precipitation induced by acetonitrile then liquid–liquid extraction was performed using ethyl acetate. Reversed phase HPLC was carried out using C18 analytical column (50 mm × 4.6 mm i.d., 5 µm) with a simple isocratic mobile phase composed of 0.1% formic acid and acetonitrile (60:40, v/v). Detection was performed on a triple quadrupole mass spectrometer employing electrospray ionization technique, operating in multiple reaction monitoring (MRM), with the transitions of m/z 130.2 → 60.1, m/z 462.3 → 191.0, m/z 260.2 → 183.0 and m/z 390.2 → 268.2 for MET, CFZ, PPL and TDF, respectively, in the positive ion mode. The analysis was carried out within 5 min over a linear concentration range of 50–5000 ng/mL for MET and 10–1000 ng/mL for CFZ. The method was validated in accordance with the FDA guidelines for bioanalytical method. All obtained recoveries were higher than 90.0% while the accuracy was in the range of 88.14–113.05% and the relative standard deviation was below 10.0% for all investigated drugs by the proposed method. The achieved promising results has allowed for the successful application of the developed LC–MS/MS method to a pharmacokinetic study of the target drugs after their oral administration to Egyptian healthy volunteers. The pharmacokinetic study was accomplished after the agreement of the ethics committee. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s13065-019-0597-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.