ABSTRACT
Obesity that is associated with a high consumption of slimming substances is considered a public health problem around the world. In this context, the increasing consumption of phytotherapeutic formulations as alternative obesity treatments has revealed the presence of synthetic pharmaceuticals as adulterants. The illegally added adulterants are frequently anorexic, anxiolytic, and antidepressant pharmaceuticals. This review aims to describe the analytical methodologies utilized for the determination of adulterants in slimming phytotherapeutic formulations. Furthermore, this review describes some important adulteration cases, which occurred mainly in Europe, Asia, Brazil, and the USA.
ABSTRACT
The use of synthetic pharmaceuticals in phytotherapeutics can be defined as an illegal practice, since these compounds are normally present as non-declared compounds in the phytotherapeutical formulations. This work aims to show the development of an analytical method based on adsorptive cathodic stripping voltammetry (AdCSV) for the simultaneous determination of 1,4-benzodiazepines and amfepramone. The developed method was used to measure seven benzodiazepines (clonazepam, flurazepam, alprazolam, midazolam, medazepam, chlordiazepoxide, and diazepam) and amfepramone in slimming formulations that have been commercialized in Brazil. This method permits the screening of adulterant classes in a single voltammetric run by using a hanging mercury drop electrode as a working electrode and Ringer buffer (pH 10.0) as a supporting electrolyte. Recovery values ranging from 92.0% to 117.0% demonstrate the reliability of the method in the determination of adulterants in real samples. Among the 12 samples studied by the proposed method, 4 were demonstrated to be adulterated by 1,4-benzodiazepines.
