That’s up from 20 last week. The agency updated a page on its website late Monday that keeps track of what’s now being called an outbreak.
More than a week ago, information surfaced that revealed Main Street had shipped possibly tainted steroid injections to medical facilities in several states. The pharmacy has since voluntarily recalled more than 300 products.
As federal and state health authorities search for the source of the problem, there’s a national push for more regulation over compounding pharmacies .
So what does that mean for the average consumer and their safety?
It may sound fancy, but compounding pharmacies have been around for hundreds of years.
“You’re taking multiple ingredients and combining that into a product for the patient,” explains Brett Wright, who runs Benevere Pharmacy in Collierville.
Think of the days when your grandma got sick. There weren’t always pain medicines on shelf, so the pharmacist created something. Fast forward to today, and places like that still
exist.
exist.
“There’s not a one size fits all, so all medications don’t fit all the needs of patients,” adds Wright. Like other compounding pharmacies, pharmacists at Benevere can mix up drugs to create something patient specific.
Wright says, “We can convert a capsule over to a liquid, that’s a good example. Also, we make transdermal cream so if people have some side effects, issues swallowing, they might take a medicine orally, we can combine that into a cream.”
Benevere doesn’t make injectables and they don’t ship across state lines. This is where the problem seems to lie. Compounding pharmacies that mass produce fall into a gray area.
Unlike big pharmaceutical companies that make new drugs, compounding pharmacies sidestep federal scrutiny, so oversight is up to each state.
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