Pharmaceutical Companies Developed Scientific ...



Pharmaceutical Companies Developed Scientific, Manufacturing Technology

The pharmaceutical companies that arose during the1800s not only helped to develop but also applied the manufacturing technology that eventually removed the traditional functions of procuring and compounding drugs from the prescription laboratories maintained by pharmacists.

Large-scale productions of pharmaceutical chemicals in the United States began in 1786, when Christopher Marshall, Jr., and Charles Marshall, wholesale and retail druggists in Philadelphia, began extensively to produce muriate of ammonia and Glauber’s salt. After 1825, the subsequent managers equipped the firm with a jacketed copper pan, a filter press and open furnaces, and began to specialize in solid extracts and other pharmaceutical products.

During the early 1800s, the establishment and development of several pharmaceutical companies made Philadelphia the most important center for manufacturing prescription products. For example, Rosengarten and Sons, founded in 1822, was the first company to produce quinine sulfate in the United States and then, later, began to manufacture morphine salts (in 1832), piperine (1833), mercurials and strychnine (1834) and codeine, bismuth and silver salts (1836).

However, the increased demand for pharmaceutical chemicals and products generated by the Civil War furthered the establishment and development of pharmaceutical companies. Frederick Stearns and Company of Detroit, for example, replaced its 12-foot-by-12-foot prescription laboratory in its pharmacy with a plant – equipped with steam power, milling machinery and extraction apparatus – that covered the entire floor space of a four-story building.

The technological advances that occurred between 1860 and 1880 also enabled pharmaceutical companies to manufacture prescription products that embodied the qualities of purity, uniformity and reliability that physicians desired for their therapeutic products. For example, E.R. Squibb and Songs of Brooklyn invented ways to prepare not only pure ether but also pure drugs and then made these improved products available for physicians to utilize or prescribe.

The growth of most large pharmaceutical companies usually involved the preparation initially of galenicals (often starting with fluid extracts), then expanded to the production of various chemicals and, eventually, progressed to the systematic production of biologicals after the turn of the century. Eli Lilly and Company of Indianapolis, for example, started in 1876 with the production of fluid extracts, syrups and pepsine preparations and then expanded its product line by 1915 to include anti-streptococcus serum and bacterial vaccine for typhoid.

As technological advances occurred during the late 1800s, most prescription laboratories maintained by pharmacies could not compete with the blandishments proffered by large pharmaceutical companies. Although prescription laboratories could adapt some innovations – such as improvements in percolation apparatuses that advanced the processes of drug extraction, most pharmacists never considered such adaptations very practicable for their laboratories.

The mass-production of parvules – or small pills – and the introduction of coated and compressed tablets also precluded the average prescription laboratories from producing many medications. Despite efforts to increase their education, many practicing pharmacists did not become well versed in producing these new drug forms until after local production had become scarcely feasible economically.

Although numerous pharmaceutical companies developed in the United States, most firms that produced medicinal chemicals and products were based in Germany. For example, Merck and Company of Rahway, New Jersey, began in 1891 as the American branch of E. Merck-Darmstadt, located in Darmstadt, Germany.

Many German companies, however, did not manufacture their products in the United States. Instead, the companies acquired patents that afforded the protection necessary to sell their products in America.

Germany remained the leading producer of pharmaceutical chemicals and products until World War I. During that time, legislation occurred in the United States that allowed the government to seize and sell the patents for various pharmaceutical products to companies based in the United States.

[Sources: Pharmacy: An Illustrated History (1990) by David L. Cowen and William H. Helfand, and, (Edward) Kremers’ and (George) Urdang’s History of Pharmacy (1976) revised by Glenn Sonnedecker, Ph.D.]

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