Acetone → Acitretin

Participants

Reaction Steps

Acitretin was obtained by stirring the contents of thirty 25 mg capsules of etretinate in ethyl acetate for 4 days, filtering and concentrating to dryness to give recovery of greater than 90% of the theoretical quantity of etretinate. This etretinate was then dissolved in 20 ml of ethanol, 3 ml of 4N KOH, and enough acetone to make the solution one phase. The solution was stirred at room temperature for 2 1/2 days, acidified to pH 3 with 3N HCl, and extracted with ethyl acetate. The ethyl acetate was washed with brine, dried over Na2SO4, filtered and concentrated to give a 69% yield of acitretin.

Provenance & Evidence