Question of the Day: June 21, 2013 How Many States Have Fixed These Major Problems Relating To Compounding Pharmacies?

Examples of the major findings of the report include:

--State boards of pharmacy generally do not know which pharmacies engage in compounding. For example, only Mississippi and Missouri routinely track the number of compounding pharmacies in their state.

-- None of the states have requirements for pharmacies to disclose the volumes of compounded drugs they produce or whether compounded drugs are being sold across state lines.

-- Only thirty-two states were able to provide historical data on the number of licensed pharmacies in their states.

--Thirty-seven states do not routinely track which pharmacies are providing risky sterile compounding services, the service which led to the meningitis outbreak.

-- States typically do not maintain pharmacy inspection records that enable them to identify systemic and repeated compounding pharmacy safety problems. 

-- On average, states employ just 5 inspectors (a range of 1-30 inspectors was reported) with responsibility to inspect all pharmacies, and only 19 states provide their inspectors with special training to identify problems with sterile compounding.

-- States are unable to effectively police compounded drugs shipped into their states from other states.

Source report prepared by staff of Congressman Ed Markey.  The full report prepared by the staff of Rep. Markey is available: HERE.