Electrochemical Sensors for the Detection of Anti-asthma Drugs in Pharmaceutical and Biological Fluids: A Review

Background Worldwide, the prescriptions for asthma drugs are on the rise. However, anti-asthma drugs have side effects and can lead to fatal death at higher doses. Quite often, these drugs are abused as growth promoters in poultry/livestock as well as by athletes to enhance their performance. Consequently, it is vital to design uncomplicated, portable, rapid and highly sensitive means of detecting these anti-asthma drugs in pharmaceutical formulations and other sample matrices. This review highlights the use of electrochemical sensors as alternative methods to conventional analytical techniques for detecting anti-asthma drugs in pharmaceuticals and biological fluids. Methods Literature covering diverse detection methods for anti-asthma drugs were reviewed to provide background information in this area of research. Next, the literature survey focused primarily on the emergence of the nanotechnology platform, including the strengths and weaknesses of this approach. Finally, a perspective on the future direction of this method was summarized. Results Electrochemical sensors offer several advantages over conventional methods, which require long and tedious extraction, pre-concentration and clean up steps. Moreover, electrochemical sensor techniques are less expensive, easy to operate and avoid the need for harmful reagents known to generate a huge amount of non-environmental friendly chemicals. Conclusion Nanotechnology-based electrochemical sensors represent a promising platform for analysing anti-asthma drugs in pharmaceuticals and biological fluids given their beneficial effects such as low cost, use of less health hazardous materials, and compatibility with environmental health.