Ketoconazole,-2-(1H-imidazole-1-ylmethyl)-1,3-dioxolan-4-yl]methoxyl]-phenyl]piperazine (I), is a highly effective broad-spectrum antifungal agent which is used to treat a wide variety of superficial and systematic mycoses.1,2 It has an advantage over other imizazole derivatives of producing adequate sustained blood levels following oral administration. Meanwhile, ketoconazole may cause some changes in cytochrome P-450-dependent monooxygenase activities 4,5 as well as in epoxide hydrolase activity. 6 Due to the vital importance of ketoconazole determination in biological fluids and in pharmaceutical preparations, several chromatographic 3,7-11 and spectroscopic [12][13][14][15][16] methods for its quantitative determination have been reported. However, some of these methods need expensive equipment and/or are time consuming.On the other hand, ion-selective membrane electrodes which are selective to a variety of ionic drugs have attracted increasing interest because of their potential use in pharmaceutical analysis. [17][18][19] The inherent advantages of ion-selective electrodes (ISEs) are simplicity, short measurement time, low cost, adequate precision and accuracy, adequate detection limits, wide analytical range, and particularly the ability to measure the activity of various drugs selectively, and in most cases, without prior separation of the drug of interest from the formulation matrix in colored or cloudy samples. These make ISE potentiometry very attractive for pharmaceutical analysis. [20][21][22] In this paper, we describe a simple potentiometric PVC-membrane sensor for the determination of ketoconazole in pharmaceutical preparations and in biological matrices. The membrane used in this electrode was made from liquid-plasticized PVC and was based on a water-insoluble ketoconazole-tetraphenylborate ion pair as an ion-exchanger.
Experimental
ReagentsAll of the chemicals used in this study were of the highest purity available and were used without further purification, except for vacuum drying over P2O5. Doubly distilled deionized water was used throughout. Reagent-grade ketoconazole as well as tablets and creams containing 200 mg and 2% of the drug, respectively, were obtained from Behvazan pharmaceutical company, Rasht, Iran. Reagent-grade nitrophenyl octyl ether (NPOE), tetrahydrofuran (THF), sodium tetraphenylborate (NaTPB), high relative molecular weight PVC and the nitrate salts of all cations used (all from Merck) were used as received.A working standard solution of 0.05 mol dm -3 ketoconazole was prepared by dissolving 0.2657 g of pure drug in ca. 6 cm 3 of 0.2 mol dm -3 hydrochloric acid and diluting to the mark with water in a 10 cm 3 calibrated volumetric flask. More dilute solutions were prepared by further dilution of appropriate volumes of the standard solution with water.The ion exchanger was prepared by shaking 5.0 cm 3 of a 0.01 mol dm -3 ketoconazole solution with an equal volume of a 0.01 mol dm -3 of sodium tetraphenylborate.The resulting ketoconazole-tetraphenylborate ion-pair precip...