Flow injection simultaneous determination of acetaminophen and tramadol in pharmaceutical and biological samples using multiple pulse amperometric detection with a boron-doped diamond electrode

• Acetaminophen and tramadol were simultaneously determined using a BDD electrode.
• FIA and multiple pulse amperometry were used to develop the novel analytical method.
• The new method was used in the determination of the drugs in pharmaceutical tablets.
• The method was also used for the determination of analgesics in biological samples.
• The obtained results agree at 95% confidence level with those of a HPLC method.

ABSTRACTAn analytical procedure was developed for the simultaneous determination of acetaminophen (ACP) and tramadol (TRA) by flow injection analysis with multiple pulse amperometric detection (FIA–MPA) using a cathodically pretreated boron-doped diamond electrode (BDDE). The proposed method was applied to the simultaneous determination of ACP and TRA in pharmaceutical samples and synthetic biological fluids. The obtained results are in acceptable levels, the proposed method presents low RSD values (< 2.70 and 4.70% for intra- and inter-day, respectively), linear ranges from 1.0 to 100 μmol L− 1 for ACP and from 0.08 to 10 μmol L− 1 for TRA, limits of detection of 0.03 and 0.04 μmol L− 1 for ACP and TRA, respectively, elevated analytical frequency (approximately 85 injections h− 1) and adequate accuracy (confirmed by comparison with HPLC results).

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