Determination of Stavudine as an Antiretroviral Drug against HIV by Selective Oxidation Methods

Two simple and selective spectrophotometric methods were developed for the quantitative determination of stavudine in pure form and pharmaceutical formulations, The first method is basedon the selective oxidation of this drug with either Ce^IV in acid medium and absorption maxima at282 nm. Second method is based on the formation of a colored oxidative coupling product between2, 6-dichloroquinone chlorimide and the drug.This method showed absorption maximum at 528 nm.Both methods followed Beer s range in the concentration range of 2-10 μg ml^-1 and 2-12 μg ml^-1,Good correlation coefficients (0.991-0.9967) were found between absorbance and the correspondingconcentrations of the drug. The calculated apparent molar absorptivity values are found to be 3.17 x10^4 and 3.32 x 10^4 I mol^-1cm^-1. The limits of detection and quantification are also reported for both spectrophotometric methods. Intra-day and inter-day precisions and the accuracy ofthe methods have been evaluated. No interference was observed from common pharmaceutical adjutants. The reliability of the methods was further ascertained by performing recovery tests by standard addition method.