Voltammetric determination of paracetamol in tablet formulation using Fe (III) doped zeolite-graphite composite modified GCE

Although paracetamol is known to have excellent safety profile at recommended therapeutic doses, health effects are also reported at acute overdoses. A sensitive and selective voltammetric method using Fe(III) encapsulated zeolite/graphite composite modified glassy carbon electrode is presented in this work for the determination of paracetamol in tablet formulations. In contrast to the unmodified electrode, a fourfold increase of cyclic voltammetric oxidative peak current paralleled by reduced potential difference (ΔE(p)) at the modified electrode confirmed electrocatalytic property of the modifier towards oxidation of paracetamol. The oxidative peak current showed linear dependence on concentration range 0.5–200 μM with R(2) and LOD of 0.9989 and 0.01 μM, respectively. The paracetamol content of four brands of tablet samples was found in the range 95.95 ± 0.23–103 ± 0.52% of the theoretical values. Recovery results between 94.54 ± 0.82 and 102 ± 0.34% for spiked paracetamol in tablet samples validated the selectivity of the method for determination of paracetamol in real samples.