Enantioselective analysis of 4-hydroxycyclophosphamide in human plasma with application to a clinical pharmacokinetic study.

Cyclophosphamide (CY) is one of the most common immunosuppressive agents used in autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. CY is a prodrug and is metabolized to active 4-hydroxycyclophosphamide (HCY). Many authors have suggested an association between enantioselectivity in CY metabolism and treatment efficacy and/or complications. This study describes the development and validation of an analytical method of HCY enantiomers in human plasma by high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) that can be applied to pharmacokinetic studies, filling this gap in the literature. HCY enantiomers previously derivatized with phenylhydrazine were extracted from 200-µL plasma aliquots spiked with antipyrine as internal standard and a mixture of hexane and dichloromethane (80:20, v/v) was used as the extraction solvent. The derivatized HCY enantiomers were resolved on a Chiracel(®) OD-R column using water:acetonitrile:formic acid (55:45:0.2, v/v) as the mobile phase. No matrix effect was observed and the analysis of HCY enantiomers was linear for plasma concentrations of 5-5000ng of each enantiomer/mL plasma. The coefficients of variation and inaccuracy calculated in precision and accuracy assessments were less than 15%. HCY was stable in human plasma after three successive freeze/thaw cycles, during 3h at room temperature, and in the autosampler at 4°C for 24h after processing, with deviation values less than 15%. The method was applied to evaluate the kinetic disposition of HCY in a patient with multiple sclerosis who was pretreated with intravenous racemic CY for stem cell transplantation. The clinical study showed enantioselectivity in the pharmacokinetics of HCY.

Analysis of cyclophosphamide and carboxyethylphosphoramide mustard enantiomers in human plasma and application to clinical pharmacokinetics.

This study describes for the first time a method for the sequential analysis of the enantiomers of cyclophosphamide (CY) and its metabolite carboxyethylphosphoramide mustard (CEPM) in human plasma. The CY and CEPM enantiomers were extracted from plasma using only ethyl acetate and separated on a Chiralpak(®) AD-RH column using a mixture of water:acetonitrile:ethanol (45:30:25, v/v/v) plus 0.1% trifluoroacetic acid as the mobile phase at a flow rate of 0.5mL/min. No matrix effect was observed in the analysis of the enantiomers of both analytes and the analytical method was linear in the range of 0.05-25.0µg and 250-1000ng of each enantiomer/mL plasma. The coefficients of variation and relative errors obtained for the assessment of intra- and interassay precision and accuracy were less than 15%. CY and CEPM were found to be stable in human plasma after three successive freeze/thaw cycles, during storage for 4h at room temperature, and after 24h inside the autosampler at 4°C, with deviations less than 15%. The method was applied to the study of the pharmacokinetics of CY and its metabolite CEPM in patients with multiple sclerosis (n=10) who received a CY pretransplant conditioning regimen for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. The pharmacokinetic parameters showed plasma accumulation of the (S)-(-)-CY enantiomer (S/R ratio=1.3) and lack of enantioselective exposure to the CEPM metabolite (S/R ratio=1.0).