Local man continues to feel side effects of tainted steroid injections
http://www.courierpress.com/news/2013/jul/06/30pt-hed1-10-hed1-10-inches-02/
This a article from a Evansville newspaper
From the article…
The Indiana board is committed to protecting citizens, Director Greg Pachmayr said, board investigators conduct unannounced inspections in compounding facilities.
The pharmacy board is doing the best it can, pharmacy law expert and Purdue University professor G. Thomas Wilder said, but that might not be enough.
Indiana’s board has a handful of investigators, Wilder said. After last year’s outbreak, other states’ legislatures expanded their regulatory agencies’ budgets and staff. The Indiana General Assembly hasn’t responded to last year’s outbreak with similar legislation.
Ninety-one people in Indiana developed illness or injury from the outbreak, and 11 died. What’s more is FDA observers found unsafe conditions at an Indianapolis facility in April.
The Indiana Board of Pharmacy is probably underbudget and understaffed, State Rep. Steve Davisson, R-Salem, said. Davisson is Vice Chairman of the Indiana General Assembly’s Public Health Committee.
He said the Legislature will likely wait and see what happens to the bill in Congress. Voting on that bill isn’t scheduled yet, so it’s far from law.
Rep Davidsson is a community Pharmacists… working for a independent pharmacy in southern Indiana.. A couple of years ago.. the Indiana Legislature responded to the pressure of the chain industry to increase the allowed RPH/tech ratio from 1:4 to 1:6.. To help “justify” this change… the law requires that a tech pass one of two recognized certification tests… of course… anyone can be hired as a “tech in training” and has one year to pass a test. Of course, a Pharmacist could have anywhere up to 6 techs in training under their supervision… no requirement for a ratio of certified techs to techs in training…
This new tech ratio was granted around the same time that the BOP gave WAGS special permission to have a pilot program of around 20 stores in Indianapolis for their “Pharmacist out front” program. I suspect that there was no link between these two separate changes…
Indiana is one of a few states .. that has a budget SURPLUS… maybe there is a lesson here to other states… short change the safety of your residents… and you too can have a budget surplus !
Filed under: General Problems
It looks like a very ‘pathetic’ situation with the board of pharmacy in Indiana, and the legislature does not appear to give dip about people. The news media must not have given much attention to all these people that were made sick and died. It takes the media to ‘stir the pot’. So, where is the media? It looks like the media is ‘on vacation’.