Determination of Fluoxetine and Norfluoxetine in Serum by Liquid Chromatography with Fluorescence Detection

A reversed phase liquid chromatographic procedure with fluorescence detection for the simultaneous determination of fluoxetine and its active metabolite, norfluoxetine in human serum is described. A 0.5-mL aliquot of the sample after the addition of protriptyline as the internal standard is passed through a 1-mL BondElut C18 silica extraction column. The column is selectively washed to remove polar, neutral, acidic and weakly basic compounds. The desired compounds are eluted with a 0.25-mL aliquot of a mixture of 0.1 N perchloric acid + acetonitrile (1:3). A 20-uL aliquot of the eluate is injected onto a 15 cm × 4.6 mm (i.d.) column packed with 5-um C8-silica particles, which is eluted at ambient temperature with a mobile phase containing tetramethyl-ammonium perchlorate. The peaks are detected with a fluorescence detector (ex = 235 nm; em = 310 nm). In the resulting chromatogram, there are only few extraneous peaks, fluoxetines give sharp peaks which are well resolved from peaks for solvent and internal standard. The extraction recovery of fluoxetines and internal standard is in the range of 85%.