Simultaneous determination of nineteen major active compounds in Qiangshen tablet by UPLC-ESI-MS/MS

An ultra high performance liquid chromatography coupled with triple quadrupole mass spectrometry method has been developed to evaluate the quality of a pharmaceutical herbal preparation, Qiangshen tablet, through a simultaneous determination of 19 major active compounds (stachydrine hydrochloride, betaine, gallic acid, sodium danshensu, morroniside, loganin, protocatechuic aldehyde, gardenoside, sweroside, acteoside, paeoniflorin, ginsenoside Re, rosmarinic acid, salvianolic acid B, ginsenoside Rg1, psoralen, isopsoralen, ginsenoside Rb1, paeonol). Chromatographic separation was achieved on an ACQUITY UPLC® BEH C18 column (2.1 × 100 mm, 1.7 μm) by gradient elution with the mobile phase of 0.1% formic acid aqueous solution (A) and acetonitrile (B). Multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode with positive and negative electrospray ionization interface was operated to detect the 19 compounds. All calibration curves showed excellent linear regressions (r > 0.999) within the test range. The precision, repeatability and stability of the 19 compounds were below 2.0% in terms of RSD. The recoveries were 97.5–102.2% with RSD of 1.0–1.9% for Qiangshen tablet samples. The method was successfully used for the analysis of samples of Qiangshen tablet. In conclusion, a rapid, sensitive, precise, accurate and reliable UPLC-ESI-MS/MS method has been developed for the simultaneous detection of 19 active compounds with large difference in level of content in the pharmaceutical samples of Qiangshen tablet, which can be applied for the quality control of Qiangshen tablet.