Rapid high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the measurement of atenolol in plasma using UV detection.

A rapid, selective and reproducible high-performance liquid chromatographic method has been developed for the measurement of the beta-adrenoceptor blocking drug atenolol in small (400 microliters) volumes of plasma. Following solid phase sample preparation using Bond-ElutTM mini-columns the compound is separated by high-performance column liquid chromatography on a microparticulate (6 microns) cyano column using acetonitrile--ammonium dihydrogen phosphate (4:96) containing triethylamine (0.25%, v/v) as the mobile phase, and the absorption of the column effluent is monitored at 224 nm. The practical limit of quantitation, based upon an assay volume of 400 microliters, is 25 ng/ml for atenolol. The average coefficient of variation is 3.1%.