What is Compounding?
Compounding is when the pharmacy creates a specialized medication for a specific patient by combining, mixing, or altering ingredients to meet the individual’s needs. Often these begin with active ingredients in powder form mixed together into a formula that is usable for the patient. This is acceptable under certain situations when, for example, a patient may be allergic to a dye in a commercially available medication and a compounded version can be created without that dye, or for patients who cannot take a tablet or capsule, and a medication only comes in those forms, the pharmacy may compound it into a liquid formulation.
Taylor Drug in American Fork (the Lindon location does not currently compound), can compound specialty medications as prescribed by your physician (please note that the Lindon location does not currently offer compounding services). However, we do not compound sterile medications (injectables, eye drops, nose sprays, ear drops, etc.). We can make custom medication in the following dosage forms:
- Capsules
- Suppositories
- Creams
- Ointments
- Lotions
- Troches
- Lollipops
- Throat Sprays
- Liquids
Compounded medications are specially made on a patient-by-patient basis, and most compounds have much shorter shelf-lives than regular medications, often only 30 days. Compounding is also labor intensive and requires much more time to complete than regular medications. Some compounded medications actually require hours to set up completely. Lastly, compounded medications are not generally covered under insurance. Because of the above limitations with compounded medications, we require payment up front before make them (to make sure it’s really wanted). If paid the before noon on Monday – Friday, the compound should be ready by 5:00 pm that day, barring ingredient issues. If paid for after noon, the compound will be ready by five o’clock the next day, except for weekends (we don’t have compounding technicians/pharmacist on weekends). Please call the American Fork store for any compounds.
