The Use of Portable Near Infrared Spectroscopy for Authenticating Cardiovascular Medicines

Medicine counterfeiting is a public health threat that contributes to morbidity and mortality worldwide. In cardiovascular disease in particular, counterfeit medicines can lead to unpredicted adverse effects, especially among patients who take multiple medicines to treat multiple conditions. Therefore, a rapid approach for authenticating cardiovascular medicines would be ideal. This work used portable near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy to authenticate eight different cardiovascular medicines. Thirty-five products of these medicines, purchased from eight different counties worldwide, were tested. NIR spectra were processed using spectral pretreatment combined with correlation in wavelength space (CWS) and principal component analysis (PCA). For the CWS method, an r value of 0.95 was considered to be the threshold. CWS provided a quick answer regarding the authenticity of the test products, showing that five products passed (r values > 0.95) and three failed, possibly indicating that failed products were counterfeit or substandard. The latter results were confirmed by PCA, where clear clusters were distinct between the reference and test products of the three medicines that did not meet the CWA threshold. This study demonstrates that portable NIR spectroscopy potentially offers a quick and mobile method for authenticating cardiovascular medicines that is useful in critical situations.