Pharmacy Information

USP has been providing public standards to enable consistent drug quality since 1820, when pharmacists and practitioners usually compounded the medicines. While USP's range of official standards has significantly expanded over the years to answer the needs of modern pharmaceutical manufacturing, it continues to provide regularly updated standards for compounded preparations and other pharmacy-relevant practices. USP provides the resources to help pharmacists ensure that they are dispensing quality medicines, whether they buy these medicines from pharmaceutical manufacturers and store them or compound the medicines based on a physician's prescription. U.S. federal law requires that if pharmacists prepare medications that are named in the USP–NF published by USP, these products must meet USP–NF standards for identity, strength, quality and purity, packaging, labeling, and storage. USP's requirements for pharmacy practice are also enforceable by various state laws in the United States.

In order to better serve the pharmacy community, USP will now publish relevant regulatory requirements and other useful information in a dedicated publication, the USP Pharmacists' Pharmacopeia. USP also offers other resources and programs to guide the pharmacy community in applying regulatory requirements and in participating in USP's public processes to establish future requirements.

Learn about the new USP Pharmacists Pharmacopeia and other products and resources that USP has for pharmacists and students and professors of pharmacy.