Depletion of Urinary Zilpaterol Residues in Horses As Measured by ELISA and UPLC-MS/MS

Three horses were dosed with dietary zilpaterol and the urine concentrations measured from withdrawal day 0 to withdrawal day 21. The analyses were carried out using both enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and an ultraperformance liquid chromatography with triple-quadrupole-tandem mass spectrometric detection (UPLC-MS/MS). The UPLC-MS/MS method was developed to provide rapid analysis with positive analyte identification by following three product ions and computing the two independent ion ratios. When urinary zilpaterol concentrations were between 0.2 and 2 ng/mL, the ELISA had interday recoveries of 114-120% with coefficients of variation (CV) of <22%; intraday recoveries were 79-111% with CVs of <13%. For urinary zilpaterol concentrations of 0.4-40 ng/mL the UPLC-MS/MS method had interday recoveries of 94-104% with CVs of <8%; intraday recoveries were 97-102% with CVs of <= 7.5%. Correlation analysis demonstrated that the ELISA and UPLC-MS/MS methods returned essentially the same results, especially at urinary zilpaterol concentrations below 2000 ng/mL. Urinary excretion peaked rapidly after dosing between 5300 and 10800 ng/mL (UPLC-MS/MS) or between 5900 and 17900 ng/mL (ELISA) for the different horses, much higher than observed in other species. Urinary zilpaterol concentrations declined rapidly to below 3000 ng/mL within 24 h of study day 1. After about 5 days, zilpaterol elimination slowed markedly, taking nearly 10 days for an order of magnitude decrease. The analytical methods were able to detect zilpaterol in the urine even at withdrawal day 21, demonstrating the sensitivity of each analytical method and the slow rate of zilpaterol depuration from horses.