Photo courtesy Drug Crafters

Photo by Krista Wadsworth

Photo courtesy Drug Crafters

Photo by Krista Wadsworth

Customized medications fill special needs

Drug Crafters is anything but your average corner store pharmacy.

While mainstream pharmacies provide prescription medication in one-size-fits-all doses, the licensed pharmacists and technicians at Drug Crafters provide customized solutions to individual problems, said Kirk Peterson, vice president of operations and business development who is also a pharmacist.

Pharmacy staff members at the Frisco Square business perform a process known as drug compounding—creating specialized medication dosages in forms not commercially available. Compounding is reminiscent of how medications were made before there were large-scale drug manufacturers.

The pharmacy staff works with doctors who have patients with specific dosage requirements.

"We compound products custom to a patient's needs," Peterson said. "Most of the products are prescription—probably 80 to 85 percent are custom made."

Have an aversion to needles? Drug Crafters can compound medication into a tablet or a cream.

Have a child in pain after having tonsils removed? Drug Crafters makes a Lidocaine lollipop to help numb the mouth.

"We have some great stories," Peterson said. "It's so exciting to see men and women come in and say 'I started this [medication] six weeks ago, and it has changed my life, and I can never go back.' That's pretty exciting."

The business, owned by James Dondero, president and co-founder of Highland Capital Management, opened in 2006 at Parkwood Boulevard and Warren Parkway to fill a need for doctors in the growing Frisco community. In October 2013, the business moved to its current location in Frisco Square next to Forest Park Medical Center.

Forms of medications

Common compounded medications include pain and scar creams, medicated mouthwash for chemo patients with mouth sores and anti-nausea gels.

Drug Crafters even compounds thyroid and seizure medication for veterinarian use for dogs and cats.

Hormone replacement medications are the pharmacy's most common request—and one of the reasons compounding is a growing business.

"It's [hormone replacement] a big, growing area in medicine right now," pharmacist James Jones said. "There are not a lot of commercially available products," Jones said. "What they have is a one-size-fits-all dosing, and here we can customize a dose to each individual's specific needs."

In all, Drug Crafters is able to compound close to 8,000 formulations.

Per Federal Drug Administration guidelines, Drug Crafters can't compound medications that are already commercially available, as they are not allowed to compete with manufacturers.

Physicians and patients

While compounding is not a new practice, some physicians don't write compounded prescriptions simply because they are not trained to do so in medical school, Peterson said.

"It's a select number of doctors who understand what Drug Crafters can do and feel comfortable prescribing individualized doses of medication," he said.

Because of the many specialty physicians in Frisco, Drug Crafters compounds prescriptions for people who live throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

To keep long-distance patients from having to make the drive to the pharmacy, Drug Crafters provides free shipping for its medications more than $25.