Analysis of the antimalarial, mefloquine, in blood and plasma using high-performance liquid chromatography.

An analytical method is described for the quantitation of mefloquine, a new antimalarial agent, in plasma and blood. A structurally similar quinolinemethanol compound, WR 184,806, is used as the internal standard. The method employs a three-step extraction procedure followed by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography, and octanesulfonate is used as an ion-pairing reagent. Detection is achieved at 222 nm. The entire procedure is relatively simple and requires only 1 ml of sample. Good accuracy and precision are obtained over the wide concentration range tested.