Determination of ragaglitazar, a novel dual acting peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) α and -γ agonist, in human plasma by high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry

A sensitive and specific LC/MS/MS method has been developed and validated for determination of ragaglitazar (NNC 61-0029 or DRF 2725) in human plasma. After solid-phase extraction (SPEC® PLUS™ C8) of plasma, separation was performed on a Symmetry Shield™ RP8 column (mobile phase: acetonitrile: 10 mM ammonium acetate, pH 5.6 (40:60 v/v)). Two ranges were validated having LLOQs of either 0.500 or 100 ng/ml and linearity up to either 500 or 50 000 ng/ml. The intra-assay precision and accuracy were 1.1% to 15.7% and 85.8% to 118.2% (range 0.500–500 ng/ml) and 2.0% to 8.8% and 92.9% to 104.8% (range 100–50 000 ng/ml). The method was applied for determination of ragaglitazar in plasma from phase 1 and 2 clinical studies.