Our pets are our best friends, and when it comes to their health any owner wants to provide them the best quality of care and medication possible. These days, many owners are using compounding pharmacies to help administer specific medications to their household pets.
Medication for dogs, in particular, are delivered by this method if they need different medications at one time.
However, to the general public, wrapping one’s mind to this process can be confusing to understand at first. Breaking down the basics of how compounding pharmacies work can help you as a pet owner make the best medical decisions for your furry friend.
The Basics
Animals often have differences in the same diseases humans can have today, including itchy skin rashes, annoying eye and ear infections, stressful heart conditions, cancer, and even diabetes. Medicating your pets present a unique problem that often is best dealt with through the process of compounding. Compounding is the manipulation of any type of drug that’s beyond what is described on the drug bottle.
As any pet owner knows well, treating animals can be extremely difficult with hard to swallow or foul-tasting medications. With the power of compounding, an owner can hire a pharmacy to mix their pet’s drug with another easily digestible substance, dilute it so it’s less strong as a dose, flavor it, or change the form of the dosage itself.
Veterinary drugs should be compounded with the explicit permission of the vet after the appointment, since every patient’s needs and tolerance can be extremely different. Compounding usually is needed when the animal is suffering from a physical condition where no pet medication is available to effectively treat their systems. As a result, each solution is developed on a case by case basis depending on the severity of the problem.
For example, if a cat or dog needs a certain medication that is only being produced as a pill, the owner can seek a veterinary compounding pharmacy to have the drug compounded into a flavored liquid that the pet will gladly take instead. Other popular examples that pet health pharmacies discuss with their clients who are interested in compounding are mixing two injectable drugs and preparing an oral paste that will be absorbed quickly by the pet’s body.
Obtaining Pet Medications
If you discover that your dog or cat needs a compounded medication, it’s important where your resources lie to obtain it. Sometimes your own veterinarian’s office can specifically compound a pet medication for you if the procedure is already deemed legal in the state that you live in. Otherwise, they can write up a prescription and refer you to a veterinary compounding pharmacy for further assistance.
One significant tip is to make sure that pharmacy you’re referred is licensed within the state. You can check their legitimacy by visiting the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy site and check what business are already accredited with great reviews.
If you have more than one pet suffering from the same symptoms, absolutely avoid using prescriptions for compounded medications for the both of them. Prescriptions are specifically written for individual animals, so using one pet’s compounded medication for another pet could seriously harm their health.
Safety First
Checking out the source of your pet medication is as important as the drug itself. If your pet gets sick or needs medication on an ongoing basis, explore the range of options that are available to cut down unneeded costs and hassle.
First, if your veterinarian recommends a certain prescription medication, talk to them about your concerns and if any other alternatives are available from local pharmacies. Additionally, some popular pet medications, including ones required to treat symptoms of flea and tick infections in a variety of mammals, may not immediately call for a written prescription.
However, it’s still a smart idea to talk about all the treatment routes with your vet before confirming your choice on a particular brand.
Lastly, as you weigh the pros and cons between your pet medications, consider other helpful factors like how easy the drug will be to administer, the time you will be spending to wait for its delivery, and the time frame of when your pet needs to start the medication.
The Bottom Line
Today, accessing the right pet medications for our cats, dogs, ferrets, and other pets are easier with the help of more digital pharmaceutical services. Before jumping into any types of conclusions on what will suit your pet’s needs best, be sure to listen closely to what your vet has to say for their health in the long term.
Sometimes pet owners like to believe that they know their pet better than anyone else alive, but at the end of the day, a pet pharmacy will be more efficiently equipped to get them on the road to better days.
Remember to weigh the costs of your options and the side effects that certain drugs will cause to your pet. The best way to help them feel better is to minimize the discomfort that taking medications usually leads to. With the power of compounding and a written prescription, you will be saving time and effort to build up their health!