Separation and Determination of Four Oxicams in Pharmaceutical Formulations by Thin-Layer Chromatographic—Densitometric Method

A new, simple and rapid thin-layer chromatography (TLC) method with densitometric detection for simultaneous determination of four oxicams, namely, piroxicam, meloxicam, tenoxicam and isoxicam, has been developed. The chromatographic separation was carried out on TLC F254 plates with a mobile phase consisting of ethyl acetate-ethanol-toluene 6:3:1 (v/v/v) + 2 drops of ammonia 25%. Quantitative determination was done by densitometric scanning at wavelength λ = 360 nm. The method was validated with respect to linearity (in the range from 0.05 to 0.50 mg per band), LOD and LOQ, accuracy (about 99.90%) and precision (RSD from 0.33% to 0.80%) in accordance with the International Conference of Harmonization guidelines. The method has been successfully applied to the analysis of drugs in the pharmaceutical formulations.