Kinetic spectrophotometric determination of certain cephalosporins using oxidized quercetin reagent

A simple, precise and accurate kinetic spectrophotometric method for determination of cefoperazone sodium, cefazolin sodium and ceftriaxone sodium in bulk and in pharmaceutical formulations has been developed. The method is based upon a kinetic investigation of the reaction of the drug with oxidized quercetin reagent at room temperature for a fixed time of 30 min. The decrease in absorbance after the addition of the drug was measured at 510 nm. The absorbance concentration plot was rectilinear over the range 80–400 μg mL−1 for all studied drugs. The concentration of the studied drugs was calculated using the corresponding calibration equation for the fixed time method. The determination of the studied drugs by initial rate, variable time and rate-constant methods was feasible with the calibration equations obtained but the fixed time method has been found to be more applicable. The analytical performance of the method, in terms of accuracy and precision, was statistically validated; the results were satisfactory. The method has been successfully applied to the determination of the studied drugs in commercial pharmaceutical formulations. Statistical comparison of the results with a well established reported method showed excellent agreement and proved that there is no significant difference in the accuracy and precision.