Michael O’Neal is a pharmacist. He purchases drugs for Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He often deals with drug shortages, but this one is bad. O’Neal is concerned about the availability of electrolytes. They are critical to a babies in neonatal intensive care and seriously ill adults.
Electrolytes are administered to a critically ill patient for nutritional support intravenously. They are given to patients who cannot get their nutrition any other way.
O’Neal said he’s concerned that as supplies shrink, measures will have to be taken.
“We are dangerously close, we believe, when we will have to ration care to the critically ill. I would say within days or weeks,” said O’Neal.
WOW! That is a stunner! I was a student at Vandy in the 80s when the “new” hospital was built. It is hard to imagine a short of electrolytes. I wonder if they will have to start buying from chemical companies. There is one thing that should have been corrected in the news story. These are electrolytes not drugs. While electrolytes are incredibly important to a healthy body, i don’t know of anybody who calls electrolytes drugs.
It seems that any compounding pharmacist could make these quite easily. I have definitely that only the non-chain pharmacies can compound anymore. The big chains and store associated pharmacies are worthless for anything other than “pill counting.”