California's pharmacy board is accusing McKesson of selling an "excessive" amount of controlled substances to a San Diego children's hospital and wants to revoke or suspend its wholesale license for one of its facilities, STAT reported.
According to the board's complaint, starting in the fall of 2017 McKesson began distributing to Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego much larger quantities of two controlled substances, Phenergan with codeine syrup and the anxiety drug Xanax.
The shipments of Phenergan were allegedly 40 percent to 80 percent higher after September 2017 and the shipments of Xanax increased 250 percent to 275 percent.
The pharmacy board said McKesson should have known the quantities of drugs were not typical for pediatric patients, STAT reported.
McKesson allegedly began increasing the shipment quantities because a pharmacy technician at the hospital was stealing the drugs, the complaint said, but the board said the increased quantities ordered were still unjustified.
The board seeks to to either revoke or suspend McKesson's wholesale license for its facility in Santa Fe Springs, Calif., STAT reported.
Becker's Hospital Review has reached out to McKesson for comment and will update this story accordingly.
The complaint is the latest in a series of legal troubles for McKesson, which last month agreed to a $175 million settlement to resolve claims from its investors that directors ignored suspicious opioid shipments.
In January, Oklahoma sued McKesson, Cardinal Health and AmerisourceBergen, alleging they funneled "unreasonable" amounts of opioids into the state.
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