Efficient assay for the determination of atenolol in human plasma and urine by high-performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection.

An efficient method for the determination of atenolol in human plasma and urine was developed and validated. alpha-Hydroxymetoprolol, a compound with a similar polarity to atenolol, was used as the internal standard in the present high-performance liquid chromatographic analysis with fluorescence detection. The assay was validated for the concentration range of 2 to 5000 ng/ml in plasma and 1 to 20 microg/ml in urine. For both plasma and urine, the lower limit of detection was 1 ng/ml. The intra-day and inter-day variabilities for plasma samples at 40 and 900 ng/ml, and urine samples at 9.5 microg/ml were <3% (n=5).