LC-DAD and LC-ESI-MS Chromatographic Fingerprinting and Quantitative Analysis for Evaluation of the Quality of Huang-Lian-Jie-Du-Tang

LC-DAD coupled with electrospray tandem mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-MS-MS) has been used to evaluate the quality of the traditional Chinese medicine Huang-Lian-Jie-Du-Tang (HLJDT). Twenty-five chromatographic peaks were obtained from a C-18 analytical column by gradient elution with acetonitrile and formate buffer (containing 0.5% formic acid) at a flow rate of 1.0 mL min(-1). The linearity, precision, and accuracy of the data obtained were acceptable. Thirteen components were identified by ESI-MS, and seven of these were quantitatively analyzed by LC-DAD. The method was used to analyze ten batches of HLJDT, and both chromatographic fingerprints and quantitative data were used to evaluate the quality of the HLJDT. It was concluded that this LC-DAD-ESI-MS method enables more fully validated and complete evaluation and monitoring of the quality of HLJDT.