Development of a New HPLC Method for the Simultaneous Determination of Ticarcillin and Clavulanic Acid in Pharmaceutical Formulations

A new HPLC method has been developed and validated for the simultaneous determination of ticarcillin (TIC) and clavulanic acid (CA) in pharmaceutical formulations. The HPLC separation was achieved on a beta-cyclodextrin column (Cyclobond I, 250 x 4.6 mm, 5 microm) with methanol-16 mM pH 6.0 ammonium acetate buffer (50 + 50, v/v) mobile phase at a flow rate of 0.8 mL/min. Detection was at 220 nm. Validation of the method was performed by evaluating specificity, robustness, accuracy, and precision. The calibration curves were linear in the range of 1-100 microg/mL for CA and 2-200 microg/mL for TIC. The LOQs based on the standard regression lines were 0.42 and 1.42 microg/mL for CA and TIC, respectively, and the LOD were 0.14 and 0.47 microg/mL, respectively. Total recoveries of synthetic mixtures (CA:TIC = 1:10, 1:15, and 1:30) were 99.25-100.99% for CA and 99.54-100.82% for TIC. Compared with the U.S. Pharmacopeia method, the proposed method has the advantage of a relatively low flow rate and short analysis time. The proposed method was successfully applied for the simultaneous determination of these two drugs in sterilized H20 and 5% dextrose injection solutions.