Questions and Answers on USP Chapter 797 with Clyde Buchanan:

• Question B4: Sterile Compounding Personnel - Our sterile compounding personnel watch a video and take a test annually. Do they also need to perform media fill testing?
   
• Answer B4: All sterile compounding personnel must have not only didactic review and exams but also annual media fill testing of aseptic skills, initially and annually thereafter for low- and medium-risk compounding, and semi-annually for high-risk compounding. Compounding personnel who fail written tests or whose media fill test vials show gross colonization must be immediately re-instructed and re-evaluated by expert compounding personnel to assure correction of all aseptic practice deficiencies.

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.