Amphetamine and methamphetamine determination in urine by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography with sodium 1,2-naphthoquinone 4-sulfonate as derivatizing agent and solid-phase extraction for sample clean-up.

A rapid method is described for the identification and determination of amphetamine and methamphetamine in human urine samples by liquid chromatography with UV-Vis detection. The samples were transferred onto a C18 solid-phase extraction column and chromatographed on a Hypersil ODS RP C18, 5 microns (250 x 4 mm I.D.) with an acetonitrile-water elution gradient containing propylamine. Under these conditions, the amines are eluted with a short retention time. The procedure has been applied to the determination of amphetamine and methamphetamine in the range 0.3-4.0 micrograms/ml in spiked urine samples. The detection limits at 280 nm were 4 and 2 ng/ml for amphetamine and methamphetamine, respectively. The intra-day and inter-day precision and accuracy of the method were studied.