Green and sustainable downscaled procedure using smartphone-based colorimetric determination of fluoroquinolones in extemporaneous syrup formulations

Abstract

A green and sustainable downscaled procedure was developed to perform smartphone-based colorimetric determination of fluoroquinolones in extemporaneous syrup formulations. The procedure functioned by complexing fluoroquinolones with metal ions, the most suited of which is a ferric ion, to produce a colored product in a 96-well plate combined with smartphone detection and image processing. It performs on a microscale with 1 min detection time providing high throughput at 960 samples in triplicate/h/a well plate. Linear calibrations constituted the concentration of fluoroquinolones and the relative intensity of blue, yielding LODs (3.3σ) and LOQs (10σ) for ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, ofloxacin and levofloxacin at 4.6, 8.3, 9.1 and 10.6 μg/mL and 14.0, 25.1, 27.5 and 32.0 μg/mL, respectively, (where σ served as the standard deviation of the intercept, divided by the slope of the linear calibration graph). The developed procedure was applied to real extemporaneous oral ciprofloxacin syrup samples. The results obtained by the developed procedure agreed with that of a standard method, with no significant differences at a confidence level of 95%. The developed procedure is aimed at real-world applications in assays for quality and stability of the extemporaneous formulations in community and health-promoting hospitals. This promotes health and well-being for individuals of all ages by ensuring that everyone gains access to quality essential healthcare services as well as safe, effective, high-quality and affordable pharmaceuticals.