Get the reason for preparing medicine to order.

Get the reason for the change.

A licensed pharmacist or licensed doctor can prepare a medicine to order; this is called compounding.

The FDA, or U.S. Food and Drug Administration, gives two examples: needing dye-free medicine and being unable to swallow tablets.

Ask what need the proposed change meets for you. Ask why an approved product cannot meet it.

Keep approval and quality separate.

For a compounded product, the FDA has not reviewed its safety, benefit, or quality before it is offered, as of September 2026.

Poor compounding can leave dirt or germs in a medicine, or give it too much or too little active ingredient.

The part that produces a medicine’s effect is its active ingredient. Ask who makes the product and how to speak with the pharmacist.

Ask when making a copy is allowed.

As of September 2026, federal law restricts how often a pharmacy or doctor can copy medicines that are already on the market.

For a pharmacy making medicine for one named patient, the copying limit has an exception.

Whoever writes the prescription must decide that, for this patient, the change makes a meaningful difference.

Price savings by themselves do not qualify as that difference.

Ask what change matters for your health, such as removing a dye you cannot use. Ask how that change meets the exception.

As of September 2026, adding a vitamin alone does not stop the FDA from treating a made-to-order medicine as a copy.

The copying rule is one part of the law. Request an explanation from both your prescriber and pharmacist of why the law allows your exact medicine to be prepared. Have the reason written in your care record.

A shortage claim needs a national record.

Semaglutide is in Ozempic and Wegovy. Tirzepatide is in Mounjaro and Zepbound.

As of September 2026, neither semaglutide nor tirzepatide appears on the FDA’s national shortage list.

An empty shelf at one pharmacy is not proof of a shortage across the country.

If a service points to a shortage as the reason for compounding, ask which national record it is using.