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Recovery care notebook / Medicines

# Ask which medicine the offer means.

Get the ingredient and product names on paper. Ask whether you would receive a pill, a shot or another kind of product. Ask why that exact product is being considered for your problem.

Approval of a product is a different question from its use in your care.

FDA, the Food and Drug Administration, handles U.S. drug review.

Compounding is the name for preparing your medicine to order. The finished product does not come ready-made from a drug company. A pharmacist, doctor or drug-making site registered with FDA can do this.

The U.S. approval and legal information below is current to September 26, 2026.

Compare the status of the product, rather than the confidence of the pitch.

| Type | What the status means | Ask the clinician
| An approved drug product | FDA approval concerns a particular product and use; some peptides are approved medicines. | What is this product approved to treat, and is that the use being discussed?
| A compounded preparation | This preparation has no FDA approval. For a compounded drug, the quality, benefit and safety have not been verified by FDA before sale. | Why does my need call for this preparation rather than an approved product?
| A chemical labelled for laboratory research | A research-only label describes a chemical for lab work. FDA warning letters have alleged illegal sales of unapproved drugs when sellers used such labels but promoted the products for people. | Why is a chemical labelled for lab work being offered as care for me?

## Custom preparation has limits

Compounding can help with an allergy to a dye that an otherwise suitable approved drug contains.

As of September 26, 2026, the law also limits the ingredients a regular compounding pharmacy may use.

So ‘custom’ leaves a question open. Ask for the ingredient, the reason for using it and the pharmacy’s name. A prescription alone does not answer all of those questions.

### A registration claim is not a product answer

Registering a drug-making site with FDA does not mean FDA has approved the site or its drugs. This rule was checked September 26, 2026.

Ask what a badge or registration actually refers to. Keep the answer beside the product name.

## Ask who will supply it

FDA warns that people buying medicines made to order through online care services or pharmacies may not know who actually made them.

Request that name before comparing offers. A pharmacy board is the state body that licenses pharmacies.

The FDA lookup page connects readers with each state’s pharmacy records.

[Open the state pharmacy lookup page](https://www.fda.gov/drugs/besaferx-your-source-online-pharmacy-information/locate-state-licensed-online-pharmacy)

Sources and when we checked them

FDA approval and registration: September 26, 2026. Finding a pharmacy’s state licence record: September 17, 2026.

- [FDA on the role of compounding](https://www.fda.gov/drugs/human-drug-compounding/compounding-and-fda-questions-and-answers)
- [FDA on prepared-drug quality](https://www.fda.gov/drugs/human-drug-compounding/understanding-risks-compounded-drugs)
- [What registration confers](https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-21/section-207.77)
- [State pharmacy records](https://www.fda.gov/drugs/besaferx-your-source-online-pharmacy-information/locate-state-licensed-online-pharmacy)

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This notebook is a guide for weighing care choices; it offers neither clinical visits nor products.

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