Response to “Injection Lipolysis With Phosphatidylcholine and Deoxycholate”

Extract

I am writing this commentary to caution surgeons not to overinterpret the results mentioned in the original Reeds et al¹ study (of which I was an author, and which was referenced in the Letter to the Editor from Drs Hasengschwandtner and Gundermann) and assume that the results offer proof that injection lipolysis using drugs from compounding pharmacies is safe and efficacious. The purpose of my response is not to rebut the comments from Hasengschwandtner and Gundermann.

The original article by Reeds et al¹ was an institutional review board–approved study in a very small group of subjects utilizing a combination of phosphatidylcholine/deoxycholate (PC/DC) produced by MasterPharm (Richmond Hill, New York), a compounding pharmacy. This PC/DC formulation represents only 1 potential combination of PC/DC and, as there is no established or proven ideal combination, other compounding pharmacies might produce a different formulation. The best agent would be a synthetic single drug of known purity and concentration that has gone through the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) drug approval process to establish safety and efficacy as well as proper dosing and delivery parameters.