LC/MS/MS Analysis of Immunosuppressants from Whole Blood using Aeris™ Core-Shell HPLC/UHPLC Columns from Phenomenex

Cyclosporine A, tacrolimus, sirolimus, and everolimus are four of the most commonly administered immunosuppressant drugs and play a central role in the success of tissue and organ transplants. These drugs are most typically analyzed from whole blood using LC/MS/MS. However, because of the analytical challenges posed when working with whole blood, many of the published methods rely upon complex and/or expensive extraction steps prior to use of the actual analytical column. This application note presents a rapid and effective method for the analysis of these four immunosuppressants from whole blood that uses a simple protein precipitation step followed by direct injection onto a wide-pore core-shell HPLC column (Aeris WIDEPORE 3.6 μm XB-C18). The method displays excellent accuracy and is sensitive down to the low μg/L (ng/mL) range.