Determination of secnidazole in tablets and human serum by cathodic adsorptive stripping voltammetry

The electrochemical reduction of secnidazole was carried out in BR buffer solutions in the pH range 2.0-11.8 by dc polarography. The polarograms exhibited two irreversible reduction waves in acidic media and one wave in alkaline media, corresponding to the reduction of nitro group in the drug. The cathodic adsorptive voltammetric behavior was studied on glassy carbon electrode to optimize an analytical method for determination of secnidazole. The drug was determined in the range between 4.0 x 10(-6) and 1.2 x 10(-4) mol L-1. The proposed method was successfully applied to the determination of the drug content in tablets with mean recovery and relative standard deviation of 100.91% and 1.82%, respectively. It was also applied to human serum with a good precision and accuracy. (C) 2010 King Saud University. All rights reserved.