LC method for determination of prasugrel and mass spectrometry detection for thermal and alkaline degradation products.

A stability-indicating RP-LC method for the determination of prasugrel in tablets was developed and validated. Stress testing of prasugrel was carried out in accordance with ICH guidelines, where the drug was submitted to acidic and basic hydrolysis, oxidative, thermal and photolytic conditions. Prasugrel was unstable under all the conditions and the degradations products were analyzed by HPLC-UV. Furthermore, two main degradation products found under alkaline and thermal conditions were investigated by LC-MS. Based on the fragmentation patterns, two products resulted from hydrolysis of the acetate ester moiety of prasugrel were observed. Due the chemical equilibrium, tautomerism occurs between the ketone and alcohol functions justifying the similar molecular weight and fragment pattern obtained in degradation products analysis. Successful separation was achieved on a RP-18 octadecyl silane column using acetonitrile and triethylamine 0.5% mixture (50:50, v/v) as the mobile phase at 25 degrees C. The flow rate was 1.0 mL/min and the detector wavelength was 263 nm. The method proposed in this work was successfully applied to quality control of prasugrel and contribute to stability assessment of pharmaceutical products containing this drug.