Keep in mind
Understand the pharmacy-made medicine
Medicine review in the US is the role of FDA, the Food and Drug Administration.
For the medicine on your question sheet, compounding describes a pharmacist or doctor preparing or mixing it to order. A facility registered with FDA can also do this.
That facility is a larger place that makes medicine in batches and has signed up with FDA.
At the September 2026 check, FDA had issued no approvals for medicines prepared to order. FDA did not check how well they were made, whether they worked, or their safety before they were offered to patients.
Ask what checks the pharmacy uses before it sends the medicine.
Beyond the name you found
Ask what changed after the shortage
FDA ended the national semaglutide injection shortage listing on February 21, 2025.
The national shortage list had no semaglutide injection entry at the September 2026 check.
No national shortage listing is created just because a local pharmacy has no stock.
As of September 2026, ordinary pharmacies could not regularly make essentially the same product as an available approved medicine.
A health professional authorised to issue prescriptions is called a prescriber.
The change must make a medically important difference to one named patient, in the prescriber’s judgement.
A general example is making medicine without a dye for a patient allergic to that dye.
Ask what change is proposed for you and why you need it.
A lower price by itself is not that medical difference.
Keep in mind
Ask for the patient-specific reason
What need in my case would this change meet, and which pharmacy would make the medicine?
Ask for both answers. Then check the pharmacy in your state’s licence records.
Beyond the name you found
Read the ingredient name closely
As of September 2026, FDA said a semaglutide shot with added vitamin B12 could still count as a copy of the ready-made drug.
Adding the vitamin did not by itself remove the need for a change that matters medically for the named patient.
Semaglutide sodium and semaglutide acetate are names for changed chemical forms, called salts. FDA says they are different ingredients from the semaglutide in approved drugs.
As of September 2026, FDA said it knew of no lawful basis for using those salt forms in compounding.
Here, “salt” is part of a chemical name. Look for “sodium” or “acetate” after “semaglutide” in the written ingredient name.
Check claims about the productEndnotes
Notes for this chapter
- FDA: what compounding does and how it is reviewed
Making a medicine to order differs from FDA product approval.
- FDA: semaglutide shortages and limits on making similar medicines
Read the changes to the rules, including the vitamin example.
- FDA: semaglutide salt forms
Read FDA’s warning about ingredient names ending in “sodium” or “acetate.”