|
 Madison
Pharmacy Associates Earns Industry’s Top Quality & Safety Accreditation
April 2008: Women’s
Health America’s specialized pharmacy, Madison
Pharmacy Associates,
is the first pharmacy in Wisconsin, and one of the few in the nation, to earn
the prestigious Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board’s Seal of
Accreditation.
The accreditation was awarded
after Madison Pharmacy Associates (MPA) met or exceeded the rigorous standards
created by the eight national professional pharmacy organizations that make up
the PCAB, and confirms that MPA consistently meets the highest quality and
safety standards in its profession.
MPA earns new Board Certified Status,
high marks on quality and safety
“We are among the first in America to
be Board Certified,” said Marla Ahlgrimm, R.Ph., CEO and Founder of MPA and
Women’s Health America, Inc. “Madison Pharmacy Associates has always been
viewed as the nation’s leader in the area of customized low-dose hormone
therapy. We combine ongoing research to improve drug delivery choices and to
develop diagnostic testing  methods
while maintaining superior standards for prescription purity and accuracy. Our
new PCAB designation as a PCAB Accredited™ Pharmacy
validates the commitment to excellence that we’ve always made to patients and
their doctors, and lets the public know that MPA ranks among the best for
quality and safety.
“When we opened our
doors in 1982, we had a vision of what personalized healthcare for women should
be—an integration of exacting pharmaceutical science, state-of-the-art
laboratory technology, and the traditional values of listening and responding to
a patient’s individual needs. Earning the PCAB Seal of Accreditation confirms
that we’ve been on the right path all along. As we begin our 26th year in
business, we look forward to the challenge of continuing to set new standards
for safe, high-quality patient care.”
The PCAB Seal of Accreditation
is another glowing achievement in a long line of ‘firsts’ for MPA and Women’s
Health America:
To earn PCAB Accreditation, Madison Pharmacy
Associates completed a rigorous 9 month review by the Pharmacy Compounding
Accreditation Board. MPA opened its doors for an extensive on-site inspection
conducted by PCAB pharmacy experts. Only when these stringent reviews were
completed did the Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board officially grant
Madison Pharmacy Associates the PCAB Seal of Accreditation
and the right to use the designation “PCAB Accredited™ Pharmacy.”
“We are honored by this new accreditation. It
confirms our commitment to providing safe, personalized solutions that meet the
medical needs of our patients—and the needs of our healthcare providers who
rely on us for these specialized medicines,” said Ahlgrimm. “We believe this
will further strengthen the bond of trust between our pharmacy, patients, and
prescribers.”
 About
Marla Ahlgrimm, R.Ph. - Women’s Health America and Madison Pharmacy Associates
Founder and CEO
Marla Ahlgrimm has made educating women
about
healthcare options her personal mission. An acknowledged women’s health expert
and healthcare provider, she was the first in the country to recognize and
develop low-dose natural hormone options for treating Premenstrual Syndrome in
the 1970s. Since then, she has built her career around serving the unique and
complex health needs of women through access to accurate information and quality
health products. She holds a degree in pharmacy from the University of
Wisconsin, Madison. She has co-authored two definitive women’s health books: The
HRT Solution and
Self-Help
for Premenstrual Syndrome.
The WHA Story
WHA’s story began more than 26 years ago when
Marla was approached by a doctor who needed help with his patient—a
35-year-old woman who suffered two weeks each month with severe mood swings,
irritability, and depression. Through research, Marla found that in Europe there
was a name for the woman’s condition—premenstrual syndrome.
At that time treatment options
prescribed in Europe weren’t available in the United States. Marla worked with
the woman’s doctor to develop a special prescription that would modify her
hormonal fluctuations. Through Marla’s work, the woman became the first
patient diagnosed with severe PMS in the United States, and the first to use
natural progesterone.
Doctors learned of Marla’s success
and soon brought new patients to her to have individualized prescriptions
filled. In 1982, in response to the demand for customized prescription services,
Marla co-founded Madison Pharmacy Associates, the first compounding pharmacy in
America to specialize in women’s hormonal health.
 Over the years, many of Marla’s patients began
coming to her for help with other concerns, including perimenopause, menopause,
and osteoporosis. She and her staff continued their research and developed even
more innovative, individualized hormone therapies. WHA’s Restore®
Program—the
first, and still the most comprehensive hormone therapy program in the nation—revolutionized
hormone therapy by moving beyond the “one-size-fits-all” approach to offer
hormone testing, individualized prescription care, and free follow-up testing to
monitor outcomes.
Today, the specialized nurses, pharmacists, and
staff of Madison Pharmacy Associates and Women’s Health America have used
Marla’s unique approach to work with more than 10,000 healthcare providers,
offering individualized hormone therapy to more than 300,000 women—restoring
balance, one woman at a time.
 About
Compounding
Compounding medications is an integral part of
the practice of pharmacy and the demand for these customized medications are
increasing every year. Yet many people may not even be aware of its role.
Compounded medications are prescriptions that are written by physicians and
other legally authorized prescribers and prepared for an individual patient by a
specially trained pharmacist.
With the high volume of prescriptions that are
compounded each year, there has been a need for an enhanced, profession-wide
system of standards by which each compounding pharmacy can test its quality
processes. While compounding pharmacy is regulated by the state, PCAB
Accreditation is an even more comprehensive way to ensure a compounding pharmacy
is meeting the highest quality and safety standards.
 About
Madison Pharmacy Associates
and Women’s Health America
Women's Health America, Inc. is the
national leader in the treatment, management, consultation and education of
women about premenstrual syndrome (PMS), perimenopause, and menopause, and is
internationally recognized for its expertise in hand compounded prescriptions
for individualized low-dose natural hormone therapy. Madison
Pharmacy Associates, LLC, established in 1982, the pharmacy arm
of Women’s Health America, was the first pharmacy in the U.S. to focus
exclusively on women’s health.
Through our toll-free health hotline
staffed by nurses, health educators, and pharmacists (1-800-558-7046),
and extensive Internet site (www.womenshealth.com),
WHA and MPA serve patients and healthcare providers nationwide. The company is
located at 1289 Deming Way, Madison, WI 53717.
About the Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board
The Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board is
a not-for-profit corporation formed by eight national pharmacy organizations
that recognized the need for a national standards organization for compounding
pharmacy. Together, these leading organizations developed the policies and
standards for the practice of compounding pharmacy, as well as the PCAB
Accreditation criteria and processes.
For more information on PCAB Accreditation,
visit the PCAB Web site at www.pcab.org.
|
