Pharmacopeia – An Introduction
                     Pharmacopeia – An Introduction
Lavy Johnson
Writer at 
current trends and developments
creates content for
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Pharmacopeia – The word may sound like an alien to many at first instance, but 
it is related to everyone’s day-to-day life. Created from two Greek words: 
pharmakon meaning medicine and poiein to prepare; Pharmacopeia essentially 
translates to ‘process of making medicine’.
It can be best described as a formal publication of approved pharmaceutical 
standards that contain the list of all medicinal drugs with their uses, 
preparation, dosages, formulas, and usage effects published by an authority like 
a country or a global body. Technically, it consists of a series of monographs, 
which are descriptions of chemical information, preparation, and function of 
each drug ingredient manufactured or marketed in a country.
Every year countries around the world add new sets of established drug 
formulations to their Pharmacopeias with more and more advancement in 
medical science and research. This not only has been enhancing the healthcare 
sector but also the wellness industry. Pharmacopeias are not only limited 
exclusively to medical drugs but a whole lot of formulations that are on the 
borderline of cosmetics.
Why? Because over the years there has been a significant change in consumer 
behavior concerning health and wellness products, unleashing the creation of a 
huge health-conscious consumer segment. This is giving rise to the age of 
cosmeceuticals, and their growing importance in the space of pharmacy. 
cosmeceuticals, a more marketing term is used for products having cosmetical 
value with ingredients mentioned in the monograph of Pharmacopoeia, 
classified as a drug.
Importance of Pharmacopoeia:
Pharmacopoeia is a vital component of drugs and cosmetics safety systems and 
an instrument for the protection of patients and consumers. The primary 
purpose of pharmacopeia is to help ensure these medicines and their 
constituents are safe, effective, and of fitting quality.
Role & Functions of Pharmacopoeia:
Pharmacopoeia helps furnish quality specifications for ingredients and their 
general requirements for applications. The prevalence of such specifications is 
of utmost importance for proper functioning or regulatory control of the 
cosmetics sector. 
Pharmacopoeial standards form the base to establish quality requirements for 
preparations of individual pharmaceutical formulas in their final form used in 
cosmetics and beauty products. The utility of pharmacopeia can be considered 
at two levels. At the national level, it promotes the improvement of products 
and helps eliminates those substances that do not obey the limits of the 
standards. At the global level, pharmacopeia ensures that countries that have to 
import pharma products obtain substances of a certain quality that can be 
controlled based on the standards.
List of pharmacopoeias:
At present around 140 independent countries refer to 30 large and small 
national and 3 large – African, European, and International- pharmacopeias. As 
many as 60 active pharmacopeia commissions carry out the work of developing 
and maintaining these compilations.
Global Perspective:
At the global level of the Pharma regulatory field, International Pharmacopoeia 
issued by the World Health Organization strives to achieve wide global 
uniformity of quality specifications in pharmaceuticals.
But the most popular publication of the list of medicinal drugs followed 
worldwide is the American Pharmacopoeia standard. Called the United States 
Pharmacopoeia, or simply USP, not only has the most expansive focus on the 
pharmaceutical industry worldwide but also has a prominent role in setting 
standards for the cosmetics and personal care industry. It has remained a 
practitioner-based, non-governmental standards-setting organization unlike any 
of its other global counterparts.
Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP):
Consumers must have come across the word ‘IP’ printed on medicines as well as 
some cosmetics products. Well, it is Indian Pharmacopoeia, the official record 
book of standards under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940 and Rules 1945, 
containing all manuals of medicines manufactured and marketed in India. 
Interestingly, the first IP standard list was published in 1946. It is now a 
mandatory suffix used in all non-proprietary drug names of products in the 
Indian subcontinent. Indian Pharmacopoeia is published and maintained by the 
Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission on behalf of the Union Health Ministry. The 
set of standards published under the title Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP) historically 
follows from the British Pharmacopoeia.
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