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SWEDESBORO, N.J., Dec. 3 /PRNewswire/ -- Wedgewood Pharmacy has introduced the Refresh(TM) exchange-program, which lets veterinarians return expired custom-compounded medications for exchange, at no cost. The program is a compounding-pharmacy profession first. Through the program, the company will exchange unopened, expired compounded veterinary medications that are in its regular formulary of more than 6,000 medications, including those prepared by other compounding pharmacies. Controlled substances and oncology-related medications are the key exceptions.
Compounded-medications, which are custom-made based on a prescription order from a licensed veterinarian or physician, have much shorter shelf-lives than manufactured drugs, generally from 30 days to six months. In states where pharmacy regulations permit, many veterinarians keep commonly prescribed compounded medications in inventory for office use. If those drugs expire while in inventory, they must be discarded.
George J. Malmberg, R.Ph., F.A.C.A, F.A.C.V.P., the pharmacist president and CEO of Wedgewood Pharmacy explained, "In July, we surveyed our veterinarian prescribers; 77% of them said that containing costs is a very important issue for them. When we asked how we could help them with this issue, they said 'Do something about the short shelf-life of compounded medications.' We listened and developed the Refresh exchange-program in response."
Compounded medications have conservative "beyond-use" dates because it is not feasible to subject every custom-made prescription to the testing and validation that drugs manufactured in quantities of tens of millions undergo. Beyond-use dates are determined from compounded-drug stability data when available or are calculated using criteria established by the United States Pharmacopoeia.
Malmberg noted, "Customers who helped us to design this program were
surprised and delighted that we will exchange medications that were
compounded by
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