DENVER — One of the most commonly prescribed medicines in the world is now in short supply.
The Federal Drug Administration announced earlier this month that there is a shortage of certain forms of the antibiotic amoxicillin.
Those shortages are impacting Colorado parents like Laurie Dolman.
Dolman's 8-year-old daughter, Millie, got strep throat and was prescribed amoxicillin right away.
"She laid out here are your three choices: you can get a shot on your bottom, and we knew that that wasn't going to be a great option. You could do liquid medication or you could do chewables, and the chewable sounded like probably the easiest option at the time," Dolman said. "So just a basic run-of-the-mill antibiotic."
What she didn't realize was the struggle she'd have to go through to get her hands on the antibiotic.
"We went right to Walgreens because the pediatrician had sent the prescription over there," she said.
But the problems were evident right away.
"They said, 'oh, sorry, we're working on it. Come back in a half hour.' So we went to kill some time and came back in a half hour, had to wait through the progression of cars at the drive-thru, and by the time we got through we had already heard that there was a shortage of amoxicillin," Dolman said. "I asked specifically, 'can you please call around and see if you can find it elsewhere?' Because at this point, the pediatrician's office is closed, there isn't enough time that night to change the prescription to something else."
After three hours and a drive across town, Dolman was finally able to get the amoxicillin.
Though after days of having a sick 8-year-old, Dolman said she was just happy to have the medication.
"I felt lucky in some ways because I've heard stories of other families that haven't been able to get their prescription filled for a couple of days," she said.
