Rapid micellar HPLC analysis of loratadine and its major metabolite desloratadine in nano-concentration range using monolithic column and fluorometric detection: application to pharmaceuticals and biological fluids

Background: Loratadine is a commonly used selective non-sedating antihistaminic drug. Desloratadine is the active metabolite of loratadine and, in addition, a potential impurity in loratadine bulk powder stated by the United States Pharmacopeia as a related substance of loratadine. Published methods for the determination of both analytes suffer from limited throughput due to the time-consuming steps and tedious extraction procedures needed for the analysis of biological samples. Therefore, there is a strong demand to develop a simple rapid and sensitive analytical method that can detect and quantitate both analytes in pharmaceutical preparations and biological fluids without prior sample extraction steps. Results: A highly-sensitive and time-saving micellar liquid chromatographic method is developed for the simultaneous determination of loratadine and desloratadine. The proposed method is the first analytical method for the determination of this mixture using a monolithic column with a mobile phase composed of 0.15 M sodium dodecyl sulfate, 10% n-Butanol and 0.3% triethylamine in 0.02 M phosphoric acid, adjusted to pH 3.5 and pumped at a flow rate of 1.2 mL/min. The eluted analytes are monitored with fluorescence detection at 440 nm after excitation at 280 nm. The developed method is linear over the concentration range of 20.0-200.0 ng/mL for both analytes. The method detection limits are 15.0 and 13.0 ng/mL and the limits of quantification are 20.0 and 18.0 ng/mL for loratadine and desloratadine, respectively. Validation of the developed method reveals an accuracy of higher than 97% and intra-and inter-day precisions with relative standard deviations not exceeding 2%. Conclusions: The method can be successfully applied to the determination of both analytes in various matrices including pharmaceutical preparations, human urine, plasma and breast milk samples with a run-time of less than 5 min and without prior extraction procedures. The method is ideally suited for use in quality control laboratories. Moreover, it could be a simple time-saving alternative to the official pharmacopeial method for testing desloratadine as a potential impurity in loratadine bulk powder.