DETERMINATION OF SULFALENE IN PLASMA, RED-BLOOD-CELLS AND WHOLE-BLOOD BY HIGH-PERFORMANCE LIQUID-CHROMATOGRAPHY

A normal phase high-performance liquid chromatographic method using dichloromethane-methanol-perchloric acid (1 M) (96:9:1, v/v) at a flow-rate of 1 ml/min on a Nucleosil 100-7 column (250 x 8 x 4 mm) and UV detection at 254 nm, has been developed to determine the concentration of sulfalene in plasma, red blood cells and whole blood after oral administration of the antimalarial drug metakelfin. The coefficient of variation was 7.1% and the extraction recovery was 82%. Mean concentrations of sulfalene on days 1, 7 and 15 were: 49.56, 10.46 and 2.24-mu-g/ml in plasma, 25.02, 4.34 and 0.84-mu-g/ml in red blood cells and 21.12, 4.44 and 1.00-mu-g/ml in whole blood, respectively. Quinine, chloroquine, desethylchloroquine, mefloquine, primaquine, sulfadoxine, pyrimethamine and dapsone did not interfere in the detection of sulfalene.