A Drug Content, Stability Analysis, and Qualitative Assessment of Pharmacists’ Opinions of Two Exemplar Extemporaneous Formulations

Abstract

Despite a decline in the number of active pharmaceutical ingredients prepared extemporaneously using proprietary products, there remains a need for such products in the community (for example, liquid medicines for paediatrics which may be otherwise commercially unavailable). A lack of experience and quality assurance systems may have diminished pharmacist’s confidence in the extemporaneous preparation process; therefore, pharmacists were asked to prepare two proprietary products, omeprazole and amlodipine. The resulting products were characterised in terms of variability in drug quantity, stability, particle size and antimicrobial properties. Furthermore, a self-administered questionnaire was used to assess 10 pharmacists’ opinions on the perceived complexity of the extemporaneous compounding process and their overall confidence in the final extemporaneously compounded products. Drug content studies revealed that 88.5% and 98.0% of the desired drug content was obtained for omeprazole and amlodipine, respectively. Antimicrobial properties were maintained for both drugs, however variability in particle size, particularly for amlodipine, was evident between formulations. While pharmacists who partook in the study had some or high confidence in the final products, they reported difficulty formulating the suspensions. Findings from this study provide insight into pharmacists’ views on two extemporaneously prepared products and highlight the variability obtained in preparations prepared by different pharmacists.