1 Month "dry"

[Hunchback]

Ever since February there's been major problems with EDEX and Caverject availability here in France, it's been harder and harder to find anything. All the pharmacies have huge waiting lists etc.
Apparently there's a major production problem with the EDEX syringes, so all production has stopped since February and for some weird reason PFIZER who are making Caverject can't follow with the demand.

So yesterday i decided to finally call them and see what's going on, when the medication will be available again... Girl on the phone told me that this whole month there will be nothing produced or sold for reasons related with their competitor EDEX being in trouble. That means, a whole month (and even more, because i am pretty sure when they actually start shipping again there won't be enough to go around) with no options to replace a chronical-disease treatment drug. We have 4 doses left from last month that will now have to last us a whole damned month! Oo

Ok, i know this is not a LIFE-SAVING medication, but still there is NO substitute here in France. Seriously, what the fuck PFIZER? :/

Anyways, just a rant... It'll be a hard (or actually soft) month. *sigh*

[PaleAle]

Hello Hunchback, like yourself I too live in France, although I am English. I was prescribed Edex back in March, and only managed to get one prescription made up before the shortage started. I saw my own doctor, and he prescribed me Caverject, which I managed again to get one prescription made up before that went 'en rupture' So like you I am now without anything to inject, as it is either Edex or Caverject in France with no other injectable alternatives.

I wasn't as brave as yourself in telephoning Pfizer but did send them an e-mail, to which they responded very promptly. In the e-mail they stated that Caverject should be available again from mid July, so get ready with your prescription and try and get to the front of the queue from mid July.

I did find a chemist in the UK that will supply Caverject without a prescription, they charge £12.50 an injection, but you must pay £25 for a private prescription. As I do not need a full dose each time I can usually get about three injections out of one vial. So if things get desperate I may consider buying the stuff from the UK, unfortunately they only send to UK addresses so you would have to send it to somebody you know in the UK, and they would have to forward it on to you.

[Hunchback]

Hey PaleAle,

I am not actually French either

FYI, the Edex shortage has been going on since February, which is quite insane to be honest. When it started getting impossible to get Edex i got my doctor to make a prescription that's for the chemical compound only, not a particular drug, that way i could get Edex OR Caverject. Then Caverject started disappearing as well...
Last month was rough, down from 3-4 shots a weak, we had only 4 shots left from the previous month, we had to "ration" them carefully... *sigh*

However, good news is my pharmacist managed to get 4 boxes of Edex, so that's 8 shots and they said it's "slowly coming back". According to Pfizer Caverject should come back at the start of July, meaning that pharmacies should have it mid-July.
If all goes well, next month BOTH drugs should be back to normal... In any case, get your pharmacist to call you as soon as they get a delivery

[RalphB]

Actually, there was a recall of 10mcg Edex. Evidently, there was a problem with the 10 mcg 2 pack carton due to potential lack of sterility assurance. I just asked the pharmacy for the 20 mcg pack, problem solved. Good luck.

[Hunchback]

Not really. At first it was the 10mg, however quite fast everything was stopped.

Today Edex 10/20 is slowly coming back, but Caverject is completely stopped. :/

[PaleAle]

Well Hunchy I don't know what area of France you live in, but consider yourself lucky that you are able to obtain Edex again. This afternoon I went down to my local pharmacy in the village full of hope that I would either be able to get Edex of Caverject, I knew that Caverject would probably not be available until mid July, but was full of expectation that I would be able to get my Edex prescription made up. I have a prescription for both Edex and Caverject, so I was hopeful of at least being able to get one of them.

I handed over my Caverject prescription first, but alas the nice lady told me it is still unavailable , no worries as I handed over my Edex prescription, Hunchy has had his prescription made up so there must be Edex in France, unfortunately again she informed me that it is still unavailable .

I showed the lady my e-mail from Pfizer and she has kept my prescription for Caverject, and will telephone me when it becomes available again. Tomorrow I will take my Edex prescription into another pharmacy in our nearest big town and see if I have any more luck at a larger pharmacy. So for now unfortunately the only way that I can obtain Caverject again is to pay a hefty price for it to have it delivered from the UK.

[PaleAle]

Well Hunchback I hope that you are still able to obtain your Edex, as I am still unable to get hold of either Edex or Caverject. I just tried again this afternoon, but when the pharmacist looked on her computer she informed me that both Edex and Caverject are still out of stock.

I must say that I am now getting p***** off, as I was prescribed Edex back in March this year, which as I have already stated disappeared after only one prescription. I then got one prescription of Caverject made up, and was still experimenting as to what dose was best for me. The last two doses that I tried I had no erection at all, so not only am I unable to obtain anything to inject into myself, I also do not know what is the best dosage for obtaining an erection.

I have been experimenting taking homeopathic tablets, I read on another forum that one guy takes the 5Gs everyday, those being: ginger, green tea, garlic, ginseng and ginko biloba, I also supplement these tablets with a brand name homopathic pill every other day called Xcitrex. I must admit that I do obtain a pretty impressive erection with this regime, but not quite good enough for intercourse. As this is the only option that I have at the moment, I guess it is better than nothing. Viagra and Muse did not work for me at all.

Just as a matter of interest Hunchback what department are you living in? I am in Deux Sevres obviously not a good department for Edex or Caverject.

[Hunchback]

Hey PaleAle,

I am sad to hear about your situation. To answer your questions:

I live in Nantes. Here it's been -hell- to find medication ever since i started this thread.
I somehow managed to get my full 12 doses per month (almost) every time, however last time my prescription was 15 days late. I just picked up my last 2 boxes yesterday, after having 4 boxes (EDEX) from yet another pharmacy. Basically what i do every start of month is phone all major pharmacies in town and check if they have anything. They usually don't but every now and then they get 1-2 boxes which they can "hold" for you.

FYI: EDEX10 is apparently quite freely available lately. EDEX20 is quite hard to get by but it MIGHT have just came back (for good?). CAVERJECT is COMPLETELY gone in all it's forms for the last 4 months or so.

As for doses - in France you don't really have much of a choice - 10 or 20ul is all you get. I hope you get your medication soon so that you can experiment. Keep in mind (you can check my other threads/posts) that this treatment is quite "random" and depends on a ton of things, so do not despair if it doesn't properly work at first.

[PaleAle]

Thanks for your reply Hunchback, glad to hear that you are managing to obtain your Edex, even though you are still having to hunt the stuff down. As I posted I live in Deux Sevres and my nearest large city would be Niort some 80 kilometres away, not the end of the world to travel to if they had any Edex in the pharmacies there. I am embarrassed to say that I have lived in France for nearly 9 years now, and the thought of using the telephone still fills me with dread. So to telephone the pharmacies there would be a little tricky for me.

I see that you live in Nantes, we are thinking of spending a few days sometime soon, I understand that it is a very nice city, with many places to visit and things to do, I may even be able to sneak in and steal some of your Edex.

[PaleAle]

Well Hunchback another update, I e-mailed Pfizer again yesterday enquiring about the availability of Caverject, to be fair they are very prompt in replying to any e-mails that they receive. That was the good news bit, unfortunately the reply I received today stated that they have no idea as to when Caverject will be available again in France. Fantastic. It ended with the usual grovelling apology but alas still no Caverject.

So I guess that will put more pressure on Edex, as people will be trying to switch from Caverject to Edex so it is going to be a real postcode lottery if you are able to obtain any Edex. I looked on the website in the UK that I was contemplating buying some Caverject from and they are still advertising Caverject for sale there. Totally bizarre situation that the same company is able to supply the UK but not France with Caverject.