Method development and validation of Bronopol (Preservative) and its Stability Indicating Study by UV Spectrophotometry

Preservatives are those substances that are added into pharmaceutical formulations to increase its shelf life. Prolonged use of formaldehyde in the formulations may lead to cancer and other health related issues. Besides formaldehyde has a bad odor which results in poor patient compliance. In such cases the use of bronopol can prove to be a useful option for industries. It degrades to formaldehyde but slowly and in very low amount that gives preservative action. A simple, precise and sensitive method for bronopol estimation in UV spectrophotometer was developed and validated. The method showed linearity in range of 20–100 μg/ml. LOD and LOQ values were found to be 1.22 and 3.77 μg/ml. Correlation coefficient was found to be 0.994. The developed method was also successfully applied to the pharmaceutical formulation. Stability indicating study of bronopol was also done in various conditions.