Analysis of florfenicol in pig plasma using a validated PPT-HPLC-DAD method

High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) has proven to be an effective tool for examining the disposition kinetics of florfenicol (FF), a synthetic broad-spectrum antibiotic used to treat infectious diseases in veterinary medicine. Modification and optimisation of the protein precipitation (PPT) sample preparation procedure and HPLC with diode array detector (DAD) instrumental method were carried out to ensure conditions suitable for FF analyses in pig plasma samples. Stable supernatants with good plasma mean recoveries of FF (99.8% ± 0.7%RSD) were achieved using 1% v/v phosphoric acid solution in methanol and 10% w/v sodium chloride in aqueous solution. The PPT-HPLCDAD method’s detection limit of 0.004 μg/mL and quantification limit of 0.013 μg/mL provides high sensitivity for analyses of FF in plasma samples. In addition, the optimisation of method conditions resulted in shorter extraction and analysis time and less solvent consumption, which stresses the sustainability of this method in analytical chemistry. The optimised and validated PPT-HPLC-DAD method was applied in a comparative study of FF in pig plasma after administration of veterinary medicinal products. The study was conducted on fattening pigs following repeated intramuscular administration of two similar solutions for injection at a dose of 20 mg FF/kg bodyweight (test groups 1 and 2). The solutions for injection contained the same FF concentration, i.e., 300 mg/mL, but differed in excipients. The aim was to examine the influence of administrated solutions for injection on the extent of exposure to FF in pig plasma. The dynamics of kinetic profiles of FF in pig plasma from both treatments correspond to the FF kinetic profiles published in similar studies. However, differences were observed in the concentrations of FF, which were constant throughout the study, and statistical differences between the test groups were confirmed (P<0.05). Though these findings suggest the possible influence of excipients, a full comprehensive conclusion on the influence of administrated solutions for injection on FF exposure in pig plasma requires additional research.