Compounded or Compounding medications are personalized medicines. These medicines are made to fit the patients' specific needs. For example, a patient may need a weaker or a stronger dose of a medicine. Or, a medicine is only available in capsules when a patient needs it in the liquid form. As a result, the patient's doctor prescribe these medications in these specific forms and strength. Then, the patient can bring the prescription to a licensed compounding pharmacy.
Throughout history, most of the prescriptions were custom made for the patients. The word "apothecary" was a common used vocabulary. With technological advancement in the mid 20th century, mass manufacturing of medicines became safe and economical. Nowadays, most of us usually take off-the-shelf prescription medicines when we are sick. Most of these one-size-fits-all medicines work very well for most of us. However, these off-the-shelf mass produced medicines may not meet our needs all the time. Thankfully, there are compounding medications when we need:
Different forms or dosage of a medicine
Different strength of a medicine
Different flavor of a medicine
Remove specific ingredients from a medicine because of allergies or other sensitivities
Common applications:
Sport Medicine
Pediatric
Flavor
Anti-aging / cosmeceutical
Hormone replacement therapy (HRT)
Men's health
Dental
Pain management
Hospice
Veterinary