Oxycodone shortage

Does anyone know a pharmacy in the saint pete-sarasota area that has oxycodone 30mg in stock yet? I had 180 30 mg tabs filled at a compounding pharmacy last month and that was a HUGE mistake....not only have I been vomiting for a month, but I paid 4.00 per pill and they seemed maybe 1/2 as strong as my usual dose .I so wish this mess was resolved....tired of hurting in Fl

[Tuckamore]

Sorry Captkimi,

This shortage is nation wide. It is my understanding that only hospitals are being supplied with what little is available of this drug.

[nick30]

i find it hard to believe that this is still going on. other parts of the world have no problems. why can't it be shipped from elsewhere?
is it possible to try to substitute another drug for the oxycodone?
like morphine IR for example.
just a thought

[Tuckamore]

Nick, I think the answer to your question is because the DEA and FDA have such strict regulations regarding where and from whom the US obtains it's medications.

In most cases I am glad that I do not have to worry about rat feces in my medications. But at other times I may very well be willing to swallow rat feces if it would relieve my pain!!!

[nick30]

surely some medications are imported into the US from trusted, non-rat infested auppliers?
perhaps some buerecrat is not doing his/her job very well.
this has been going on a very long time.
do you know of anything being done to help fix the situation?
the UK makes a lot of oxycodone IR, I have taken UK sourced oxyIR and it was clean, the only thing they may have slipped into it was a slight dose of good old english pessimism.
have your dr's switched you to oxycontin instead? I know it takes longer to start working but at least it's the same drug(the active component).
are you not doing too well at the moment?
Nick

[MontanaGurl]

do you have a walgreen's or walmart pharmacy available to you?  at my walgreen's if they don't have it, they always tell me that they can get it in 2 days.  Than once the only place in town that had it was Walmart and they only had 30 of them, so I rushed back to my clinic and had the doc write a script for 30 of them and than another script for the rest of them, i told him what was going on.  so the 30 was more than enough to last me for 2 days and than I went back to walgreen's and got the rest filled.  sometimes, in big hospitals they have pharmacies in them where you can get scripts filled.  have you tried that, or go to your doc and tell him what is going on and that the compounded oxy's made you sick and maybe he can give you something else for breakthrough pain until you can get the situation with the oxy shortage cleared up, or until someone gets some in.   I know how you feel, one time we went all over town looking for a pharmacy that had the oxy's and the town i get my scripts from and my meds filled at is 2 hours away from home and so no one had them and we had to drive another 3 hours away ( 5 hours from home) to a university town which is bigger and after looking for about 2 hours we found a pharmacy that had them.  thank good ness for cell phones I must've racked up 50 bucks of 411 calls for information.  the next appt with my doc i told him what had happened and he told me if that happens again to come back and he will write for something that someone has.  well the next month is when i could only get 30 of them from walmart.
sorry for what you are going through.

[nick30]

montanagurls idea about trying a hospital pharmacy is a great idea.
i've done that in the past for drugs that have been out of stock in warehouses and most pharmacies but had luck in the hospital pharmacy.
also you can ask your pharmacist to call or chk thier computers to see if another pharmacy in your area has them.
many pharmacies are linked and have inventories of other pharmacies.
good luck

nick

[MontanaGurl]

nick30 is right, maybe tell your regular pharmacist what is going on and see if he can give you a heads up on when they will get some in or what the deal is with the shortage.  maybe if they know that you will be getting them from them everymonth, they can try to order more of them in or something.  I wonder why the compounded oxy's made you sick.  I thought when they compound something that it has to have 2 or more ingredients in it.  have you asked them exactly what they put in them.  maybe they put tylenol in them or something as a compounding agent?  anywho, i hope you find some help.    let us know what you find out, i am sure that you are not the only one going through this right now and it would be nice to see someone get assistance and than offer advise to all the rest of us.

good luck to ya         montanagurl

[luppygirl]

I find it so weird that you guys in the states have a shortage and here in Canada we don't have a shortage at all. I don't get it.

[sandee1818]

I was doing alot of research last night on the shortage and I have seen that alot of people are going to the compound pharmacy to get their 30 mg. They are compounding it with ginger in the Tampa area I know and some other areas too. It seems they are expensive though at 5 bucks a pill:(
I called mallinckrodt last night also and they say that the shortage will soon end.She said that most people are able to get theirs filled if they have a regular pharmacy and can get there to have them filled as soon as they arrive. Most pharmacies have different days they have stock come in so check what day yours has theirs come in and be there then with your prescription ready. I done this today. I had an appointment and so I called the pharmacy and she said she had just enough but she could not hold them without the prescription so my doctor gave my son the prescription to have it filled while I was waiting to see the doctor, how nice:)
It seems if you use the same pharmacy they will be more apt to help. I also heard some pharmacies are telling those with insurance or medicaid that they have none when they do but they are selling them at really high prices to the cash customer's. So if you have insurance do not say so until you find out if they have them. Some have been paying cash just to get them. Mine were the normal price today though.
GOOD LUCK:)

[Ghilly]

From the way it has been explained to me by my pharmacist, the DEA has a list of how much of these drugs are needed each month to satisfy the national requirement, and they then allow for some more for those who might be new users.  They know how many pills to go each pharmacy each month, and the pharmacists can't just order it from all different sources because it hasn't been figured into the original manufacture order for the drug.  In other  words, if the original manufacture order was for 500,000 of the 15mg tablets, those 500,000 have to be doled out to all of the pharmacies who have a requirement for that drug.  If one pharmacy has, for example, 10 chronic pain patients who receive 300 pills per month, they get those 3000 pills plus a small overage to use for incidental prescriptions from doctor or from the ER, and then if it becomes apparent that those prescriptions are going to be needed on a monthly basis, the monthly requirement for that pharmacy is increased by that amount.

That is what is meant by "controlled substance".  It is controlled by the DEA from its manufacture to its sale.  Only certain companies are even licensed by the DEA to manufacture it.  When Ethex was closed down, since they were responsible for the manufacture of most of the supply, there was a shortage until another company got approved, licensed, and had the time to manufacture the amount needed by the various users around the country and ship it to the pharmacies.  There was such a backlog that it is still being caught up.  The pills were not the only thing affected, the oxycodone liquid was affected as well because it was manufactured by Ethex as well.  Mallinkrodt manufactures it as well, but it wasn't making enough of it to cover what Ethex product was needed, too.  At least that's the way the shortage was explained to me by my pharmacist.

As far as WHY Ethex lost their license, my doctor said that he was told by his sources that the pills that were being manufactured were a quality control nightmare.  They were mismarked as to the strength of the oxycodone them so people were taking too much  or not enough and a couple of people even died from taking a massive overdose without realizing it.  It was a mess.  

Hopefully, within the next month or so, things will be back on an even keel.  I hope the FDA and the DEA took a lesson from this, though, that inasmuch as there IS a need to closely monitor the manufacture of narcotic substances, they need a contingency plan in the event that something happens so that the chronic pain patients of the country are not hung out to dry again.

Ghilly

[sandee1818]

Your right on all accounts. The FDA only allows the companies to manufacture so many pills so the companies had to have a special order from the FDA to allow them to manufacture more than they are normally allowed to. Ethex was closed for the very reasons you name. I know the very first time I took them they worked GREAT! Turns out the 5mg I was taking for break thru pain was really 15 mg's. WOW! I was stunned! I was telling my pharmacist about how well the ethex worked and the Mallinkrodt did nothing compared to the ethex and she explained to me why! This is why I know I was actually taking the 15mg instead of the 5mg.

[Arkygal62]

Yes,I called and spoke to the Wal Mart and Walgreen Pharmacies,Both said they didn't have it...I also called all the local Drugs stores..The price increase is 100% and they are saying that anyone on Medicade And or medicare..Even with extra help they refuse to except the cards...I had one Pharmacy to tell me that,He wouldn't take medicade that cash and carry only and another tell me that,While the cards may pay for PART of the script that they are only paying the original price they payed before but NOT the increase..So, He would also only take cash or credit cards for this script...leaving alot of people in alot of pain...

[flower12345]

Arkygal62,

There is currently no shortage in my area. This thread is from 2009, so it's a few years old.

I would try another pharmacy....stick to the same pharmacy every month, and get to know the people behind the counter. They can really be a huge help by ordering your medications, and helping with coupons for prescriptions, checking for interactions, etc.

[Littlewing1]

I dont know where youre looking, but in my small North Fla town- at the time your post was written- there were people who charged$ 200.00 per person to ride them down to Tampa, with MRIs in hand, wait, get a script from a doctor- a meal at McDonalds, then, be  taken to a certain pharmacy involved with that Pain Doctor- THIS Is why we with chronic pain cant get our needs filled- the riders on these trips are eith drug abusers, or are getting them to sell at a profit.There it is.