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Concocting a custom-made dose Mail Tribune / Jim Craven Jessica Vineyard measures a batch of vitamins at Prescription Compounding Solutions, a Medford pharmacy that custom-mixes medicines. Medford pharmacist mixes up prescriptions to meet patients� needs By Bill Kettler Angie Meeker wants you to take your medicine � and she�ll do anything she can to make sure you do. Can�t swallow a pill? Meeker might put your medicine in a cream you can spread on your skin. Allergic to preservatives in mass-produced drugs? She�ll make your meds without the offending chemicals. Need a special dose? She�ll mix just the strength you need. Many pharmacists can make special-order drugs, but Meeker specializes in "compounding," the pharmacists� term for tailoring drugs to fit patients� needs. She buys stock chemicals from drug manufacturers, then compounds them to match physicians� prescriptions. "Compounding is all we do," said Meeker, who dispenses drugs at Prescription Compounding Solutions, just across Murphy Road from Rogue Valley Medical Center. "It�s going back to making medicines right in the laboratory." The 32-year-old Wyoming native earned a degree in education, then turned to pharmacy when she realized she wanted to help people toward better health. She focused on compounding specialty medicines when she recognized that mass-produced drugs did not meet everyone�s needs. "I thought I�d do research and education," she said, "but that doesn�t help individual people improve their quality of life." She opened her pharmacy last year after researching potential sites in western Oregon. She chose Medford when she realized that Southern Oregon had a sizable medical community, a large elderly population and no compounding pharmacy to serve them. Her tiny pharmacy bears little resemblance to a modern drug store, where the greeting card racks occupy as much floor space as the pharmacist. Jars of chemicals fill the laboratory shelves. Sensitive scales and sophisticated mixing equipment share space with old-fashioned mortars and pestles. A sterile room behind the mixing laboratory provides a space to mix inhalants and other drugs that must be sterile. In the lab, Meeker and registered compounding technicians mix active ingredients (the drug chemicals) with inactive fillers or carriers ("excipients," in the language of pharmacy). A typical day might find them mixing topical pain killers for a patient who can�t tolerate the side effects of swallowing pain pills, or making nicotine lollipops for someone who�s trying to quit smoking. "A common complaint from people who are quitting smoking is that they have nothing to do with their hands," she said. "They have that hand-to-mouth fixation." Meeker also crafts custom hormone doses for menopausal women who are in hormone replacement therapy. Mass-produced hormones aren�t available in the range of dosages that many women need, she said. "We have 200 different doses of estrogen here," she said. "The doctor tailors the dose to how the patient feels." Carole Souza of Ashland used to order replacement hormones by mail until Meeker opened her pharmacy. "She gives me the perfect balance of what I need," Souza said, "and it�s less expensive. I used to have to pay shipping charges, and my insurance company was berserk. It was terrible trying to collect (my reimbursement)." Health-care professionals also like having a local source for made-to-order medicines. "I send about 20 prescriptions a day to her," said Nisha Jackson, a Medford nurse practitioner who specializes in women�s health. "Having her here has really helped my practice. I used to have to send everything out." Patients like having a pharmacist who�s willing to find solutions for unusual problems. Mary Workman of Ashland had to visit a hospital emergency room for injections to treat her migraines and nausea until Meeker made the same drugs available in a spray form and a topical ointment. "She was a godsend," Workman said. "I can treat myself instead of having to go get an injection." Workman and other satisfied customers have brought Meeker far more work than she expected her start-up business to attract. "We thought it would be two or three years before we were busy," she said. "But we were slammed within three months." Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.