Synopsis
Providing the complex polypharmacy therapies required for hospitalized patients in an efficient, cost-effective way is a challenging daily mandate for hospital pharmacists. Over the past decade, to accomplish this goal reliance on outsourcing facilities for some portion of a hospital’s compounded sterile preparations (CSPs) has been steadily increasing and represents a significant volume of the preparations provided to patients. The 2016 Pharmacy Purchasing & Products’ State of Pharmacy Compounding Survey cites that following a dip in outsourcing usage between 2013-2015, seven of 10 (69%) health systems utilize some degree of outsourcing to meet their daily needs. As such, routine, formalized screening and evaluation of these outsourcing providers has become an essential element of the initial vetting and ongoing compliance processes for all hospitals and health systems utilizing these providers.
