Questions and Answers on USP Chapter 797 with Clyde Buchanan:

• Question B32: Packing and Transporting Compounded Sterile Preparations - We are an "outsourcing pharmacy" compounding admixtures for local hospitals. What safeguards are needed for packaging and transport to hospitals?
   
• Answer B32: Compounding personnel are expected to select packing containers and materials that maintain physical integrity, sterility, and stability of CSPs during transit. Packaging must protect CSPs from damage, leakage, contamination, and degradation (e.g., from heat exposure) and protect transit personnel from harm (if hazardous drugs are transported). Compounding personnel should ascertain that temperatures of CSPs during transit will not exceed the warmest temperature specified on CSP labeling. This means communication directly with couriers to learn shipping durations and exposure conditions. Compounding personnel must include handling and exposure instructions on the outside of containers and obtain assurance of compliance from transporters. Compounding personnel must periodically review the delivery performance of couriers to ascertain that CSPs are transported efficiently and properly.

Answer provided by E. Clyde Buchanan, MS, FASHP,  Senior Director of Pharmaceutical Services for Emory Healthcare. He is also Adjunct Professor at the Mercer University, Southern School of Pharmacy. He received his B.S. Pharmacy degree from the University of North Carolina and MS/Residency from The Ohio State University. For six years he was Assistant Director of Pharmacy at Duke University Medical Center, then served as Director of Pharmacy at St. John's Hospital in Springfield, Illinois for 11 years before going to Emory.

He has served the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists as Chair, Special Interest Group on Administrative Practice; Vice Chair, Council on Legal and Public Affairs; and member of the House of Delegates, as wel as on several committees and task forces and invited writer for several ASHP publications, including Compounding Sterile Preparations, 2nd edition.

Mr. Buchanan has authored many papers, book chapters, and two books, and he has spoken on a national and international level on a variety of clinical and administrative pharmacy topics.

All opinions expressed in the following interview are those of Mr. Buchanan. When evaluating specific recommendations regarding compounding practices, practitioners are strongly encouraged to rely on a wide array of sources, including state and local authorities, accrediting bodies such as the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, and organizations such as the United States Pharmacopeia, as well as experts such as Mr. Buchanan.