Patient complaints over compounded atropine eye drops are on the rise in New South Wales, with one patient lodging a grievance with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) after becoming aware the formulation was not sterile.
The Pharmacy Council of New South Wales, which manages pharmacy-related complaints about the conduct, performance and health of the state’s registered practitioners and students, reported the increase in complaint numbers and highlighted two cases in particular. The first involved a patient submitting a complaint to AHPRA complaining of blurred vision, dilated pupils, light sensitivity and eye pain. The symptoms occurred the morning after using one dose of a newly prescribed, low-dose atropine 0.02% eye drops that had been compounded at a local pharmacy, the council said. The patient’s specialist advised them to stop using the drops immediately, but the patient’s dilated pupils and headaches remained for several days. Discussing the symptoms with other health professionals and with the pharmacist that had prepared the eye drops, the patient became aware that the drops had been diluted from a commercially available preparation and not prepared under sterile conditions, prompting the complaint, reported the council.
The second complaint, lodged with the Council, involved several concerns about compounding practices in a pharmacy, including the practice of compounding eye drops in a non-sterile environment; the level of pharmacist training; and a lack of compounding documentation.
