Spectrofluorimetric analysis of cefoxitin in pharmaceutical dosage.

Abstract A fluorescence method involving sample pre-treatment is investigated concerning the determination of cefoxitin. A fluorescent product is formed when samples containing cefoxitin are subjected to alkaline hydrolysis with 1.0 M sodium hydroxide and heated for 60 min at 90°. The fluorescence is measured in ethanol/water medium (50% v/v) at approximately pH 2.0 provided by adding of 0.1 M hydrochloric acid. The fluorescence excitation and emission maxima were 317 and 400 nm, respectively. The quantitative range is between 0.020 and 1.40 μg/ml. A detection limit of 2 × 10 −3 μg/ml was found. The proposed method has been applied to the determination of cefoxitin in commercial injections, saline and glucosed physiological serum.