SIMULTANEOUS ANALYSIS OF VITAMIN C AND ASPIRIN IN ASPIRIN C EFFERVESCENT TABLETS BY HIGH PERFORMANCE LIQUID CHROMATOGRAPHY–PHOTODIODE ARRAY DETECTOR

Abstract

High performance liquid chromatography–photodiode array (HPLC–PDA) method has been employed for the simultaneous determination of vitamin C (ascorbic acid) and aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) in aspirin C effervescent tablets. Chromatographic separation of ascorbic acid (AA) and acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) was performed by reversed–phase using a Betasil C18 column with particle size of 3 µm, 150 mm × 4.6 mm I.D. Optimum separation was achieved in isocratic mode with a binary mobile phase (mixture of water and acetonitrile with 0.1% of formic acid, 75:25, v/v) at a flow rate of 1.0 mL min−1. Recovery of the target compounds was obtained more than 98% with good quality parameters: linearity (r 2 > 0.997), limit of detection (LOD) and limit of quantification (LOQ) values between 1.4 × 10−3 and 5.1 × 10−4 mg mL−1, and intra-day and interday precisions with relative standard deviation (RSD) lower than 2.1%. The content of the analyzed samples ascorbic and acetylsalicylic acid was found 238.23 and 393.49 mg, respectively, which are very close to the label claimed by the manufacturer in aspirin C effervescent tablets. Therefore, this method can be proposed for routine analysis of these compounds in aspirin C effervescent tablets.