Protecting veterinarians’ access to compounded veterinary medicines for emergency use

I work in emergency and critical care and animal distress and fear based anxiety is a huge problem for animal welfare and OH&S. Having access to drugs such as trazodone to be able to administer on admission if required would meet a huge difference to some patients well-being as alternatives are not reliable or may be contra indicated.

This is imperative this option for ordering medication remain viable for veterinarians to promptly and effectively treat patients

We vets need the compounded drug regulations made more suited, when used for veterinary purposes, not less suited. They need to be dealt with entirely separate to human compounded medication.

Trazadone and ear polymer are often used in our clinic and patients would suffer if these medications were not immediately available.

There will never be enough registered medicines to serve emergency animal welfare needs. The number of registrations goes down and not up. Compounded medicines have to be available to fill that gap or animals will suffer (and die). The aim is undoubtedly well intentioned but this change would be totally counter-productive. The focus needs to be on ensuring the quality and safety of comounded medicines.

As a RVN I cannot stress how detrimental this will be!!!!!

The proposed amendments to the legislation will directly cause animal suffering.

To maintain adequate animal welfare in urgent and emergency situations, it is necessary to have responsible access to veterinary medicines included compounded medications. This is even more important in regional and rural areas where the logistics of fast access to medicines is often not possible.

Currently registered in SA but moving to Victoria

Nil

We need trazodone and phenoxybenzamine on short notice and and in safe animal. We can wait days for them . 24/7 clinic

Compounded medications are critical for animal health and staff safety.

I am vet oncologist and need to give chemotherapy drugs and emergency medicines to pets routinely and they are small sized, so I need compounding to ensure I can treat them.

Some medications such as trazodone, aminocaproic acid and phenoxybenzamine are not readily available from pharmacies and suppliers and require compounding, and we need access to these medications within 12-24 hours sometimes, therefor we need to have the ability to stock certain compounded medications for emergency use in the hospital. Especially in a 24-hour emergency and referral hospital.

I am shocked by this proposition. Just last week, I had a canine patient in need of the immediate administration of methcarbamol. Without this medication on hand, I have my doubts as to whether the outcome would have been as positive as it was. This is ridiculous.

Please reconsider this proposal as it is not following good science logic, or animal welfare guidelines.

There is no science-based argument against the capacity of a pharmacist to supply GMP-compliant compounded veterinary medicines to veterinarians for emergency use. It also makes absolutely no sense why this would be prohibited.

This legislation will led to unnecessary suffering of animals.

The suggested changes are against the interests of animals, many of whom require urgent care. The proposed regulation is a barrier to Fear Free Practice.

If this proposal passes, the devastating outcome will be that pets will die before life-saving medication is given because vets can’t access it fast enough. Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP) is a prime example of a disease where if a cat is denied treatment for even 24 hours, they can die. This proposal also impacts rural veterinarians and rural family pets unfairly because receiving posted medications to more remote areas is even slower. Medications such as compounded trazodone and gabapentin are also vital in maintaining a safe workplace and reducing injuries to veterinary team members from fear-aggressive patients, not to mention calming these patients down so that they are less anxious in hospital if they need to be admitted. If vets cannot help pets ‘in the moment’ when they need the medication, it will also lead to increased dissatisfaction and helplessness within the veterinary profession and we do not want to lose anymore vets. Our profession is already stretched to breaking point. Please do not do this to us.