Purpose: The aim of the study was the development of a simple and rapid analytical procedure for the determination of the most frequently used antihistamine derivatives.
Methods: A capillary zone electrophoretic method was developed for the simultaneous separation of loratadine, desloratadine and cetirizine. Efforts were focused primarly on the optimisation of the experimental parameters: buffer composition and concentration, buffer pH, applied voltage, temperature, injection pressure and time.
Results: The optimised parameters for the separation were: 25 mM buffer electrolyte, buffer pH 2.5, voltage + 25 kV, temperature 25 °C, injection pressure 50 mbar, injection time 3 seconds, capillary 48 cm (effective length 40 cm) x 50 μm, detection at 240 nm. Under these conditions, the analysis time was below 5 minutes, the order of migration being: desloratadine, cetirizine and loratadine. The developed method was validated in terms of linearity, limits of detection and quantification, intra- and inter-day precision, selectivity and robustness.
Conclusion: Capillary zone electrophoresis proved to be a suitable method for the simulatneous determination of the three studied antihistamine derivatives.
Keywords: Antihistamines; Capillary electrophoresis; Cetirizine; Desloratadine; Loratadine; Separation.