Stereospecific determination of citalopram and desmethylcitalopram by capillary electrophoresis and liquid-phase microextraction

Solveig Andersen*, Trine Grønhaug Halvorsen, Stig Pedersen-Bjergaard, Knut E. Rasmussen, Lars Tanum, Helge Refsum

*Corresponding author for this work
    99 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    A chiral capillary electrophoresis (CE) system allowing simultaneous enantiomer determination of citalopram (CIT) and its pharmacologically active metabolite desmethylcitalopram (DCIT) was developed. Excellent chiral separation was obtained using 1% sulfated-β-cyclodextrin (S-β-CD) as chiral selector in combination with 12% ACN in 25 mM phosphate pH 2.5. Samples were prepared by liquid-phase microextraction (LPME) based on a rodlike porous polypropylene hollow fibre. CIT and DCIT were extracted from 1 ml plasma made alkaline with NaOH, into dodecyl acetate impregnated in the pores of a hollow fibre, and into 20 mM phosphate pH 2.75, inside the hollow fibre. The acceptor solution was directly compatible with the CE system. Efficient sample clean-up was seen, and the recoveries were 46 and 29% for the enantiomers of CIT and DCIT, respectively, corresponding to 31 and 19 times enrichment. The limit of quantification (S/N=10) was <11.2 ng/ml, intra-day precision was <12.8% RSD, and inter-day precision was <14.5% RSD, for all enantiomers. The validated method was successfully applied to simultaneous determination of enantiomer concentrations of CIT and DCIT in plasma samples from nine patients treated with racemic citalopram. The results confirm LPME-CE as a suitable and promising tool for enantiomeric determination of chiral drugs and metabolites in biological matrices.

    Original languageEnglish
    JournalJournal of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Analysis
    Volume33
    Issue number2
    Pages (from-to)263-273
    Number of pages11
    ISSN0731-7085
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 19 Sept 2003

    Keywords

    • Capillary electrophoresis
    • Chiral separations
    • Citalopram and desmethylcitalopram
    • Liquid-phase microextraction
    • Organic modifier
    • Sulfated-β-CD

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