Chemometrics-assisted UV-spectroscopic strategies for the determination of theophylline in syrups

Two spectrophotometric methods, assisted by chemometric tools, were developed for the determination of theophylline in syrups: derivative spectroscopy (DS) and partial least-squares regression (PLS), the latter using both artificial and natural calibration sets. HPLC technique was employed to apply a reference method in order to achieve a complete assessment of performance. Calibrations presented excellent analytical figures of merits (i.e. LOD ranged from 0.03 to 0.4 mg L−1 and analytical sensitivity ranged from 1.7 to 8.3 L mg−1). The intermediate precision presented pooled coefficients of variation ranged between 0.54 and 1.08%. Accuracy was studied trough an elliptical joint confidence region test (EJCR) comparing the obtained values when analysing spiked real samples by the HPLC and the studied methodologies. Both studied methods can be considered acceptable for the pharmaceutical quality assurance of theophylline in syrup samples.