Validated high-performance thin-layer chromatographic (HPTLC) method for simultaneous determination of nadifloxacin, mometasone furoate, and miconazole nitrate cream using fractional factorial design

A high-performance thin-layer chromatographic method for simultaneous determination of nadifloxacin, mometasone furoate, and miconazole nitrate was developed and validated as per International Conference on Harmonization guidelines. High-performance thin-layer chromatographic separation was performed on aluminum plates precoated with silica gel 60F254 and methanol:ethyl acetate:toluene: acetonitrile:3M ammonium formate in water (1:2.5:6.0:0.3:0.2, % v/v) as optimized mobile phase at detection wavelength of 224 nm. The retardation factor (Rf) values for nadifloxacin, mometasone furoate, and miconazole nitrate were 0.23, 0.70, and 0.59, respectively. Percent recoveries in terms of accuracy for the marketed formulation were found to be 98.35–99.76%, 99.36–99.65%, and 99.16–100.25% for nadifloxacin, mometasone furoate, and miconazole nitrate, respectively. The pooled percent relative standard deviation for repeatability and intermediate precision studies was found to be < 2% for three target analytes. The effect of four independent variables, methanol content in total mobile phase, wavelength, chamber saturation time, and solvent front, was evaluated by fractional factorial design for robustness testing. Amongst all four factors, volume of methanol in mobile phase appeared to have a possibly significant effect on retention factor of miconazole nitrate compared with the other two drugs nadifloxacin and mometasone furoate, and therefore it was important to be carefully controlled. In summary, a novel, simple, accurate, reproducible, and robust high-performance thin-layer chromatographic method was developed, which would be of use in quality control of these cream formulations.