High-performance liquid chromatographic determination of galanthamine, a long-acting anticholinesterase drug, in serum, urine and bile.

The anticholinesterase drug galanthamine is obtained from alkalinized serum by repeated liquid--liquid extraction. The resulting extract is approximately 100 times concentrated with respect to the original sample. Quantitative determination of galanthamine is performed with normal-phase liquid chromatography using a mixture of dichloromethane--n-hexane and ethanolamine as an eluent. Phenacetin is used as internal standard. The absorption of the column effluent is monitored at 235 nm. No endogenous sources of interference have been observed. A galanthamine serum level of 5 ng/ml is found as the minimum detectable concentration; the coefficient of variation at this level is 37.8% (n = 4). For the assay of galanthamine in the concentration range 10-100 ng/ml, standard deviations vary between 18.9 and 2.5% (n = 32).