Getting the medications that you need can be quite confusing sometimes. When you are sick things can get quite stressful and you just want to get the medications you need and know that they are the correct ones. Things get complicated when you are sent to a compound pharmacy instead of your regular one.
There aren’t that many compound pharmacies around so it’s only natural that there would be some confusion about what they are. In fact, the first time you get a prescription may be the first time you have ever heard of one. In this article, we will go over what a compound pharmacy is and what they do.
What is a compound pharmacy?
A compound pharmacy is where pharmaceuticals are made from scratch. It’s essentially a laboratory where they take the raw ingredients and chemicals and make the actual pills that end up at regular pharmacies. They are equipped with everything that’s needed to make medications and even the ultra low temperature PHCbi freezers for storage.
A regular pharmacy is different in that they simply dispense the pills or other medications as they arrive. Many are already pre-made and don’t require compounding. Others need to be made to certain specifics and that is where the compound pharmacy comes into play.
Sometimes when you get a prescription from a doctor, it is very specific to your needs. Each drug is then mixed according to the “recipe” needed for your particular treatment. It’s at the compound pharmacy where that happens since they have the raw ingredients at hand.
Why would you need to go right to a compound pharmacy?
Most prescriptions are not very specific and you just need to take the correct dose of an already mixed medication. In this case you just have to go to the pharmacy and have it filled. There are cases in which that is not going to work and you will need to go to a compound pharmacy.
For instance, if you have allergies to certain substances, a prescription will need to be mixed to order if the premade one contains an allergen for you. Many prescriptions have things like gelatin, lactose, or synthetic dyes in them. If you have an allergy or dietary restriction to any of those things then a personalized one will need to be mixed for you.
Another reason is that sometimes your needs will not be met by a preexisting drug. The type of drug may have too many active ingredients or not enough for your treatment. Too many can mean damage to your central nervous system and can overload you. Not enough and the treatment isn’t going to be effective.
There are also times when there simply isn’t a big enough need for some prescriptions to be commercially available. It makes little sense financially for some pharmacies to have these pre-made and on hand for rare occasions. This is when they can be made from scratch and totally customizable for each patient.