Development of a RP-HPLC method for screening potentially counterfeit anti-diabetic drugs

Pharmaceutical counterfeiting is becoming a serious problem in the world, especially in developing countries including China. Herein an isocratic reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC) method was developed for screening counterfeit medicines and adulterated dietary supplement products. The developed method could be employed to separate and determine simultaneously six anti-diabetic drugs (glipizide, gliclazide, glibenclamide, glimepiride, gliquidone, repaglinide) on an isocratic solvent system using an Alltima C18 column (5 μm, 150 mm × 4.6 mm) with an isocratic mobile phase of methanol–phosphate buffer (pH 3.0; 0.01 mol/L) (70:30, v/v), at a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min and at a wavelength of 230 nm. The proposed method was successfully applied to the analysis of medicinal and dietary supplement samples purchased from the local market in China.