Sensitive and rapid high-performance liquid chromatographic method for simultaneous determination of antidepressants in pharmaceutical formulations

An easy, rapid, and sensitive high-performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method is proposed for simultaneous determination of five antidepressants (trazodone, citalopram, fluoxetine, fluvoxamine and clomipramine) and norfluoxetine, a major metabolite of fluoxetine. Optimum conditions for the quantitative separation were investigated. The compounds were separated on a Nova Pack C-18 column with acetonitrile-pH 2.5 phosphate buffer, 40:60 (v/v), as mobile phase at a flow rate of 1.5 mL min(-1). Stability of solutions, linearity, repeatability and reproducibility, accuracy, specificity, and detection and quantification limits were examined to validate the method. The method is rapid and sensitive and can be applied to the analysis of antidepressants in pharmaceutical formulations and biological fluids; norfluoxetine can also be determined in these matrices. We have tested the method by analysis of several pharmaceutical formulations; recoveries obtained were between 102.7% and 98.2% of the labelled values.