title: Determination of the hydrophobicity of local anesthetic agents.
abstract: Hydrophobicity, a term used to describe a fundamental physicochemical property of local anesthetics, was in the past obtained by octanol/buffer partitioning. It has been suggested that the octanol method, despite its obvious advantages, also has some drawbacks. HPLC has become an attractive alternative for the measurement of hydrophobicity and has been applied to local anesthetics recently. However, the methods in current use for measuring the hydrophobicity of local anesthetics suffer from a number of limitations and remain obscure. This study introduces a new HPLC method for measuring the hydrophobicity of eight local anesthetics in current clinical use. Using a C(18) derivatized polystyrene-divinylbenzene stationary phase HPLC column, the log k'(w) values of local anesthetics were determined by measuring the capacity factor k'(i) in the process of chromatographic separation using a hydrophobic stationary phase and a hydrophilic mobile phase. A rapid reversed-phase HPLC method was developed to directly measure log k'(w) of eight local anesthetics. A high correlation between log k'(w) and hydrophobicity (log P(oct)) from the traditional shake-flask method was obtained for the local anesthetics, demonstrating the reliability of the method. The results reveal an improved method for measuring the hydrophobicity of the local anesthetic agents in the unionized form. This simple, sensitive and reproducible approach may serve as a valuable tool for describing the physicochemical properties of novel local anesthetics.
authors.affiliation: Center for Research in Anesthesia, Department of Anesthesia, 7 Dulles, University of Pennsylvania Health System, 3400 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104, USA.
authors.forename: Q C
authors.initials: QC
authors.lastname: Meng
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zou
authors.forename: J S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Johansson
authors.forename: R G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Eckenhoff
mesh_terms: D000473:Alkanes / Q000737:chemistry; D000779:Anesthetics, Local / Q000737:chemistry*; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid / Q000379:methods*; D011343:Procaine / Q000737:chemistry*; D012822:Silicon Dioxide / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D000473:Alkanes; D000779:Anesthetics, Local; D011343:Procaine; D012822:Silicon Dioxide; C042953:octadecyl silane-bonded silica