ABSTRACT
We gave a quick definition of pharmacy compounding in Chapter 1. In this chapter, we do a deeper analysis of what is pharmacy compounding. According to the Professional Compounding Centers of America (PCCA), pharmacy compounding is defined as follows:
Examples of pharmacy compounding are changing a medication from a solid pill to a liquid, changing or eliminating a nonessential ingredient in a medication due to allergies, or specifying exact dose(s) for both the active pharmaceutical ingredient and a specific patient. Sometimes pharmacy compounding is done to change the texture of the drug or add flavors to a medication. (Did you ever chew a pharmaceutical drug? Yuck!)
Sterile compounding is most common in the form of intravenous medications. Many groups perform the compounding of medications into
intravenous medications, including hospital pharmacists, retail pharmacists, and privately owned compounding pharmacies.
