Determination of atazanavir in human plasma by high-performance liquid chromatography with UV detection

A high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the determination of atazanavir (ATV) in human plasma is developed and validated. The method involves a rapid and simple solid-phase extraction (SPE) of ATV using Bond-elut C18 3 mL cartridge. The separation of ATV from internal standard and endogenous components is achieved using an isocratic elution on an octyl column and an UV detector set at 260 nm. The method is linear from 20 to 10,000 ng/mL (mean r2 = 0.9991, n = 10). The observed intra- and inter-day assay precision ranged from 2.2% to 14.7%[at the lower limit of quantitation (LOQ)], whereas accuracy varies between 1.0% and 14% (at LOQ). Mean drug recovery is 80.5% for ATV and 78.4% for IS. The method is found to be precise and accurate, practical enough for therapeutic drug monitoring in routine clinical practice and is applied for the assessment of 24-h ATV plasma concentration-time profiles in HIV-infected pregnant women.