Spectrofluorimetric determination of certain antidepressant drugs in human plasma

Background: Certain antidepressant drugs namely Sertraline hydrochloride, Fluoxetine hydrochloride, Paroxetine hydrochloride, Thioridazine hydrochloride and Amineptine hydrochloride were studied throughout this work using spectrofluorimetric method. Methods: The spectrofluorimetric method is based on the charge-transfer reaction of these drugs as n-electron donors with 7,7,8,8-tetracyanoquinodimethane (TCNQ) as π-electron acceptor. The drug-TCNQ complexes showed excitation maxima ranged from 290-301 nm and emission maxima ranged from 443-460 nm. Results and discussion: The different experimental parameters affecting the formation and stability of the complexes were carefully studied and optimized. The calibration plots were constructed over the range of 50-450 ng mL-1 for Fluoxetine and Sertraline, 50-550 ng mL-1 for Paroxetine, 50-650 ng mL-1 for Thioridazine and 50-750 ng mL-1 for Amineptine. The proposed method was validated according to ICH and USP guidelines with respect to specificity, linearity, accuracy, precision and robustness. Conclusion: A simple, reliable, sensitive and selective spectrofluorimetric method has been developed for determination of certain antidepressant. The proposed method was successfully applied to the analysis of the cited drugs in dosage forms. The high sensitivity of the proposed method allows determination of investigated drugs in spiked and real human plasma. © 2013, Omar et al.; licensee Springer.