Determination of Alendronate Sodium by Box-Behnken Statistical Design

Spectrophotometric and LC methods have been developed and validated for the analysis of alendronate sodium in tablet dosage forms. Methods were based on reaction of the primary amino group of alendronate with ninhydrin reagent in methanolic solution of sodium bicarbonate. The condensed product exhibited UV absorption maximum at 569 nm whereas neither the reagents nor the analyte had any UV absorption. A Box-Behnken statistical design was employed to study the effect of independent variables, ninhydrin (X (1) ), NaHCO3 (X (2) ) and drug concentration (X (3) ) on dependent variable, absorption via spectrophotometer. From the point prediction tool of design software, it was observed that ninhydrin (0.26%) and NaHCO3 (0.048 mol L-1) produced maximum absorption. These optimized parameters were then selected for method validation. The methods obeyed Beer's law over a selected concentration range with good correlation co-efficient (> 0.99). The limit of detection and limit of quantification were 4.5 and 13.75 mu g mL(-1) by spectroscopy, and 87 and 263 ng mL(-1) by LC, respectively. Accuracy, precision and % recovery were satisfactory for the proposed method. The method was highly feasible and reproducible for determination of alendronate sodium in bulk powder and pharmaceutical dosage form.