Optimization of the separation of some psychotropic drugs and their respective metabolites by liquid chromatography.

A chemometric procedure is described to optimize the separation of some drugs used in the treatment of psychotic disorders: haloperidol, levomepromazine, risperidone, venlafaxine, carbamazepine and their main metabolites: reduced haloperidol, 9-hydroxy risperidone, desmethyl levomepromazine, desmethyl venlafaxine. The purpose of the procedure is the unambiguous identification and detection in biological fluids. Isocratic reversed-phase liquid chromatography with diode array detection was utilized. An experimental design methodology was carried out in which the experimental response is selectivity. In this way the designs for mixture compounds and for process variables (five variables) was performed which produced 36 experiments to carry out. The desirability function was used to select optimum separation conditions. The procedure provides a chromatogram of well separated solutes.