(CBS DETROIT) — A Rochester mother is concerned about her 16-year-old son’s allergy medication after she says it arrived at their home without the equipment to keep it at a certain temperature.
“It’s like a gamble. It’s like Russian roulette now with this drug,” says Lisa Rutter.
Her family recently had to switch insurance companies, so if they want insurance that covers his Auvi-Q auto-injectors, they have to go through CVS Caremark’s delivery services.
“When it’s shipped to us, it’s usually shipped with a cooling gel pack to keep it at room temperature, especially at these temperatures right now,” Rutter said.
Prior to switching insurance, Rutter ordered delivery services through Auvi-Q. She says she has since received two boxes from CVS Caremark without a cooling mechanism.
“If they end up at the wrong temperature, they can actually deteriorate a little bit, which can make them less effective,” says Shikha Jain, associate professor at the University of Illinois Cancer Center. “So if someone has a life-threatening allergic reaction and needs that drug to save their life, the drug may not be as effective.”
Jain says auto-injectors like Auvi-Q should not be used in environments exposed to heat for extended periods of time.
A spokesperson for CVS Caremark sent the following statement to CBS News Detroit:
“Our mail-in drug packaging is customized for each patient by an advanced algorithm that looks at specific information from the drug manufacturer and the FDA.
We also take into account the expected weather during shipment and at the delivery destination. There are 99 different possible packaging combinations that we can use based on this data to help mitigate any weather and temperature issues.
Our mail order pharmacy has decades of experience delivering tens of millions of prescriptions over the years and we are continually refining our processes. If any of our 90 million PBM members face a unique challenge with an order, we develop alternative delivery methods to meet their specific needs.”
“You’re sending this to people who have no idea about it, so if their child has a life-threatening reaction, they have no idea that this drug could now be waste,” Rutter said.
Rutter, who is also director of Support Group Development for the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Connection Team, says she is happy to have a platform to share this with other families with children with severe allergies.
For the time being, she is in a situation where she has to get the medicines directly from the Auvi-Q delivery service outside of her family’s insurance. They deliver the medicines with a cooling gel package.
