Effect of the drug-matrix on the stability of enalapril maleate in tablet formulations

The chemical stability of enalapril maleate in tablet dosage forms consisting of different formulation excipients has been studied in this work. The influence of various parameters such as heat, moisture, light and the drug-matrix was investigated. The degradation of enalapril maleate has been followed by using an HPLC method, which was demonstrated to be specific, stability indicating, accurate and precise. The degradation kinetics of enalapril maleate in phosphate buffer solutions of pH values in the range of 2.2-10.5 were observed to be psuedo first order throughout the whole pH range studied. Enalapril maleate alone showed high stability for temperature under dry and humid conditions, however it became unstable when mixed with the drug-matrix in its tablet formulations and exposed to the same conditions. The pathway of degradation of enalapril maleate was found to be pH dependent. The extent of degradation of two different enalapril maleate tablet formulations (product A of a basic drug-matrix and product B of an acidic drug-matrix) has been investigated. The degree of degradation of the product with acidic matrix was significantly less than that of the basic matrix under same temperature and humidity conditions. Infact, diketopiperazine and enalaprilat degradants were mainly associated with the degradation of the product with the acidic matrix and that with the basic matrix, respectively. Dry enalapril maleate powder showed some photolysis, which was more significant with daylight (3.3%) compared with that under UV light (0.2%). Although the product with the acidic matrix showed some photolysis but the effect was not pronounced and the % recovery of enalapril was almost complete and within the acceptable experimental errors. However, the product with the basic matrix showed almost no response for photolysis.