A sensitive assay for the determination of E7090, a novel selective inhibitor of fibroblast growth factor receptors, and its metabolite in human plasma by UPLC-MS/MS with at-column dilution

E7090, a novel fibroblast growth factor receptors inhibitor, is currently under clinical development for the treatment of patients with solid tumors. The previous assay was insufficient in detection sensitivity for E7090 and high exposure of a dealkylated metabolite, M2, was noted in a clinical trial at low doses. Thus, a sensitive assay for the simultaneous determination of E7090 and M2 in human plasma has been developed using ultraperformance liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometer (UPLC-MS/MS). E7090 and M2 were extracted from 0.1 mL of plasma by protein precipitation and chromatographed on a reverse phase column utilizing at-column dilution which enables larger volume sample injection to the UPLC-MS/MS. E7090 and M2 were quantifiable from 0.025 ng/mL, which was 40-fold higher sensitivity than the previous assay. Accuracy as relative error and precision as relative standard deviation were within +/- 15% and 15%, respectively, ensuring the reproducibility of the assay. The developed assay method was applied to a clinical trial of E7090, and plasma concentrations of E7090 and M2 were quantifiable up to 144 h postdose. These results indicated that the developed more sensitive assay was reproducible and was successfully applied to a clinical trial of E7090.