Quantitative determination of plasma cabozantinib concentration using HPLC-UV and its application to patients with...

Cabozantinib is an oral small-molecule tyrosine kinase inhibitor that has become a standard of care for advanced renal cell carcinoma (RCC). However, cabozantinib is associated with a high rate of adverse events. Therefore, individualised cabozantinib administration and monitoring could help maximise its therapeutic efficacy and avoid serious adverse events. This study developed and validated a method to determine cabozantinib concentration in plasma using HPLC-UV. Sorafenib, an internal standard, was added to the plasma sample containing cabozantinib. A calibration curve for cabozantinib showed good linearity (R²  = 1.00), between 25 and 4,000 ng/ml. The recovery rate was above 92.1%, and the intra- and inter-day coefficients of variation were smaller than 5.2 and 6.8%, respectively. Then, we applied the method for monitoring cabozantinib blood levels in three patients with advanced RCC who were taking cabozantinib at a dose of 20, 40 or 60 mg/day. Grade 3 adverse events were more likely to occur in patients with high dosing and blood level of cabozantinib. Owing to its simplicity, the developed method can be used in general hospitals, and is expected to help maximise drug efficacy and minimise serious adverse events in many patients with RCC undergoing cabozantinib treatment.