Compounding blues

[chunkyb]

Who likes compounding?

Not me. Perhaps it's cause my teacher sucks and makes everyone who asks him any questions feel bad ?
How many hours of lab do you guys do a week of compounding? I don't feel like I'm learning anything here and I'm not confident about my compounding skills.

Just yesterday, I tried making an HC ointment and forgot the water and levigating agent!

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[dgroulx]

We don't get to do compounding until our 3rd year. It would be nice to be able to do something actually related to pharmacy.

 

[baggywrinkle]

Originally posted by chunkyb
Who likes compounding?

Not me. Perhaps it's cause my teacher sucks and makes everyone who asks him any questions feel bad ?
How many hours of lab do you guys do a week of compounding? I don't feel like I'm learning anything here and I'm not confident about my compounding skills.

Just yesterday, I tried making an HC ointment and forgot the water and levigating agent!

What are your library resources like? Where I went to school, way deep down in the bowels of the health sciences library there were Remingtons dating back to the mid 1800s. Back in the day when compounding really ment something. Using that secret ace in the hole my emulsion never cracked.

Besides that's what pharmacists really DO. Forget all these turf arguments with physicians over therapeutics. This is an area where nobody else in healthcare can walk down the street with you. Want to make a ton of money? Open a medicine shop with a PCCA membership and specialize in compounding. It is cool and it can be fun. I worked in a place that made progesterone troches and prostin E2 injection (this was before viagra) You need help with compounding - come talk to me.

Check these guys out
http://www.pccarx.com/pceutics.asp

 

[jdpharmd?]

Originally posted by chunkyb
Who likes compounding?

Not me. Perhaps it's cause my teacher sucks and makes everyone who asks him any questions feel bad ?
How many hours of lab do you guys do a week of compounding? I don't feel like I'm learning anything here and I'm not confident about my compounding skills.

Just yesterday, I tried making an HC ointment and forgot the water and levigating agent!

We have 2.5 hours of lab/week, but we didn't get to ointments this quarter (powders, capsules, troches, lozenges, solutions, ophthalmics, etc was this quarter's emphasis). Next quarter we start ointments and parenterals. It's actually kinda of fun... although I would rather just be at home.

 

[Brill]

Originally posted by baggywrinkle
Check these guys out
http://www.pccarx.com/pceutics.asp

PCCA is where we get to do our compounding lab next semester. They also run our online Pharmaceutical Calculations course. Some really cool stuff. I'd love to be able to work as a compounding pharmacist some day.

 

[Caverject]

Brill,

How do you like your calculations online? My school is considering changing it to an online course, which I have mixed emotions about. thanks!

 

[baggywrinkle]

Originally posted by Brill
PCCA is where we get to do our compounding lab next semester. They also run our online Pharmaceutical Calculations course. Some really cool stuff. I'd love to be able to work as a compounding pharmacist some day.

Oh HECK yeah, compounding is the one reason that I never had
a problem with losing my therapeutic skills. Don't be afraid of compounding people, for this is your bread and butter. It does not matter WHAT area of pharmacy practice you eventually land in - with the exception perhaps of the coffee drinking journal reading PharmD clinicians - you WILL be compounding, just at different levels of complexity. (Anyone detecting my bias?)

Walk into any hospital pharmacy sterile products room. This, my friends, is a compounding lab and you can do wonderous things here. I have mixed everything from ampicillin for injection into the eye to cyanoacrylate/tobramycin glue for fusing a broken bone together in the laminar flow hood. Your forte in this environment is IV admixture compatability and you are the undeniable expert in this domain. You will forever find physicians trying to mix things that cannot or should not be mixed, and this single topic comprises a large percentage of phone calls to Docs. The future of pharmacy is secure because medicine will always need something compounded - it will never be outsourced or done by robotics and it will never be obsolete.

In retail, even high volume retail, while your compounding may by necessity be at a very basic level due to time constraints you will be making all manner of wild-a**ed-local-home-brews with exotic sounding names such as pink lady and magic mouthwash. You will be doing lots of stuff for children that isn't in the books. One of the largest compounders is a pediatric hospital. Just this month I compounded Prevacid suspension for a baby opening the capsules and crushing the tiny enteric coated beads that are clearly labeled "Do Not Crush"

If you are fortunate you will work with one of the old guys like Don Degani of Durango Colorado. He got his license in 1952 and is still practicing as - you guessed it - a compounding pharmacist. He has forgotten more than I will ever know and was always happiest smearing coal tar on a mixing tile or brewing ibuprofen gel on the hot plate. Count yourselves lucky if you get to work with the likes of Don.

 

[lilmk]

Originally posted by chunkyb
Who likes compounding?

Not me. Perhaps it's cause my teacher sucks and makes everyone who asks him any questions feel bad ?
How many hours of lab do you guys do a week of compounding? I don't feel like I'm learning anything here and I'm not confident about my compounding skills.

Just yesterday, I tried making an HC ointment and forgot the water and levigating agent!

wow. at least you have a compounding course at your school. rip off USC didn't start a compounding class till this year but i think it's only for level 1 and 2...i'm level 3. Our class has been short changed in a lot of ways. at least i'm learning some compounding at work but only the very simple stuff.

 

[Brill]

Originally posted by South2006
Brill,

How do you like your calculations online? My school is considering changing it to an online course, which I have mixed emotions about. thanks!

I've enjoyed it. The best part about it is there are no lectures to attend so you can work at your own pace. They post lecture material online each week and you just read over it and teach yourself out of the book (they're always available if you need any help). Each week we have to do an online quiz and complete a homework assignment, both of which are only for completion grades though.

 

[Triangulation]

I'm externing in a compouding pharmacy right now and it's the bomb. Made this antifungal with crude coal tar , salicylic acid, and clobetasol. It was hella fun. My preceptor would chime in every couple moments from around the corner 'I love ointments'. He did the list of his all time faves and some of the kooky ones that he gets from old school docs ( a salve of maalox and olive oil for dermatitis)

making hormone capsules was not nearly as much fun, although getting the blue dye to mix evenly is pretty satisfying.

My question is how they're gonna bill for this stuff with Third parties becoming the norm. They better pay up. This definitely falls in the secundum artum category.

 

[chunkyb]

Originally posted by baggywrinkle
What are your library resources like? Where I went to school, way deep down in the bowels of the health sciences library there were Remingtons dating back to the mid 1800s. Back in the day when compounding really ment something. Using that secret ace in the hole my emulsion never cracked.

Besides that's what pharmacists really DO. Forget all these turf arguments with physicians over therapeutics. This is an area where nobody else in healthcare can walk down the street with you. Want to make a ton of money? Open a medicine shop with a PCCA membership and specialize in compounding. It is cool and it can be fun. I worked in a place that made progesterone troches and prostin E2 injection (this was before viagra) You need help with compounding - come talk to me.

Check these guys out
http://www.pccarx.com/pceutics.asp

Thanks, Dr. Baggywrinkle for all you advice and enthusiasm. You are truly indispensable in this pharmacy forum!

I have come to realize that Remingtons is THE Pharm BIble. It's too bad that I took it for granted this first semester of school when I heard Remingtons mentioned about a hundred million times but ignored its calling out to me. I'm sure that it would have saved me hours from trying to decrypt my prof's pharmaceutics notes. My school has one copy in the computer lab, with other books and micromedix, but the room is usually locked up so I guess that it's fair to say that my school doesn't have much of a library. Guess I'll try getting my own.

My mom says that she has a Remingtons copy from her pharm school days, back in the 70s, kickin' around somewhere in the basement. Do you think that an old copy will suffice or will I be missing out on all the 'new' updates?

Right now we're using the blue Thompson's 'Practical Guide to pharm practice'. It's alright, but to be honest, I just wish that I had a great compounding teacher to inspire me. That, and maybe more compouning ops at work.

Please keep on sharing your compounding adventures, everybody. Let's try to keep this forum positive and true to the pharmacy spirit.

 

[baggywrinkle]

Originally posted by chunkyb


My mom says that she has a Remingtons copy from her pharm school days, back in the 70s, kickin' around somewhere in the basement. Do you think that an old copy will suffice or will I be missing out on all the 'new' updates?

For classic compounding such as you are doing in pharmaceutics lab the older the Remingtons the better off you are. The seventies version is great, but a version from the forties thirties
or twenties would be even better. For my famous noncracking emulsion I found a recipe in a Remingtons from the mid 1800s. Many of those recipes went away in later editions to make room for other stuff. That started in the fifties/sixties when commercial production really took off. Trust me on this: It would be worth your time to drive many miles to a library that had such a collection. Other priceless references are the Merck Index and Martindales for their listings of critical characteristics like solubility and melting point. You don't care about therapeutic function for this work. It is all about physical chemistry.

Buy one or better yet buy them all and then never ever ever let them get out of your collection. It does not matter where you practice. You will see the day when you will wish there was a Remingtons handy. Many pharmacists bring their own into work from home. Just make sure yours doesn't grow legs and walk away. You may only use it once a year, but when you need it you need it

In fact, I have been agitating for a PDA version of Remingtons. But no one is listening. Lexi Comp responded in a limited way by adding an extemporaneous compounding field to their pediatric database. Bravo! I use it frequently. It would still be nice to have Remingtons in my pocket.

p.s. pleez don't call me Dr.- Like noncoms say in the military, I work for a living