Spectrophotometric determination of quetiapine fumarate in pharmaceuticals and human urine by two charge-transfer complexation reactions

Two simple, rapid and accurate spectrophotometric procedures are proposed for the determination of quetiapine fumarate (QTF) in pharmaceuticals and in spiked human urine. The methods are based on charge transfer complexation reactions of free base form of the drug (quetiapine, QTP), as n-electron donor (D), with either p-chloranilic acid (p-CAA) (method A) or 2,3-dichloro-5,6-dicyanoquinone (DDQ) (method B) as π-acceptors (A). The coloured charge transfer complexes produced exhibit absorption maxima at 520 and 540 nm, in method A and method B, respectively. The experimental conditions such as reagent concentration, reaction solvent and time have been carefully optimized to achieve the maximum sensitivity. Beer’s law is obeyed over the concentration ranges of 8.0 - 160 and 4.0 - 80.0 μg ml-1, for method A and method B, respectively. The calculated molar absorptivity values are 1.77 × 103 and 4.59 × 103 l mol-1cm-1, respectively, for method A and method B. The Sandell sensitivity values, limits of detection (LOD) and quantification (LOQ) have also been reported. The stoichiometry of the reaction in both cases was accomplished adopting the limiting logarithmic method and was found to be 1: 2 (D: A). The accuracy and precision of the methods were evaluated on intra-day and inter-day basis. The proposed methods were successfully applied for the determination of QTF in pharmaceutical formulations and spiked human urine