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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Vet. Sci.

Sec. Anesthesiology and Animal Pain Management

Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2025.1696093

Rapid Quantification and Validation of Etomidate and Dexmedetomidine Blood Concentrations in Rats Using a Novel Portable Mass Spectrometer

Provisionally accepted
  • West China Hospital of Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

In clinical anesthesia, precise dosing depends on feedback from blood drug concentrations. However, rapid tools for measuring these concentrations are currently limited. This study evaluated the capability of a novel portable mass spectrometer (CELL) to rapidly quantify etomidate and dexmedetomidine in rat plasma. The 50% effective dose (ED₅₀) of both drugs was determined using the up-and-down method. CELL's methodology was validated according to standard guidelines. Linear regression and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) analyses were conducted to assess the consistency between CELL and HPLC-MS measurements. The ED₅₀ of etomidate was found to be 0.9 mg/kg and that of dexmedetomidine was 21.1 μg/kg in rats. For etomidate, CELL demonstrated linearity in the range of 210–2000 ng/mL (y = 427.0x – 30526, R² = 0.995) with a limit of quantitation (LOQ) of 210 ng/mL. For dexmedetomidine, linearity was observed in the range of 6– 1000 ng/mL (y = 14669x + 109875, R² = 0.997) with an LOQ of 6 ng/mL. In the mixed group, etomidate showed linearity in the range of 100–2000 ng/mL (y = 431.4x + 11864, R² = 0.996) with an LOQ of 100 ng/mL, while dexmedetomidine exhibited linearity in the range of 5–1000 ng/mL (y = 14141x + 52430, R² = 0.997) with an LOQ of 5 ng/mL. A strong linear correlation was observed between CELL and HPLC-MS. These results indicate that CELL provides excellent performance in the rapid and simultaneous quantification of both drugs, supporting real-time monitoring to meet diverse clinical requirements. This approach has strong potential for point-of-care (POC) monitoring in perioperative veterinary and human anesthesia.

Keywords: rapid analysis, mass spectrometer, HPLC-MS, Etomidate, Dexmedetomidine, rat

Received: 31 Aug 2025; Accepted: 08 Oct 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Liu, Li, Gong, Huang and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: WenSheng Zhang, zhang_ws@scu.edu.cn

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