Mastering Medicine Flavoring: How We Improve Children’s Medicine

You love your kids, but you don’t love trying to give them medicine. But by mastering medicine flavoring, your local compounding pharmacy can actually help your kids with taking medicine.

It’s a story as old and common as time itself – so common, in fact, that virtually every family has their own set of tips and tricks for getting them down the hatch. Some parents mix the medicine into sugar, others use money like a bribe. And other play “the airplane game” to add a little fun and distraction.

But here’s the thing: some of these methods can be a problem, and you might not even be aware. Mixing certain drugs with sugar, for example, can interfere with rate of absorption. And losing even a few drops of a formula while playing that beloved airplane game might leave your child underdosed.

So, what’s a parent to do about kids medicine, anyway?

First, don’t turn to old wives’ tales and at-home methods without checking with your pharmacist. We can turn that bitter spoonful or sour pill into something a little more palatable with safe, doctor-approved medicine flavoring.

What is Flavor Compounding?

Pediatric flavor compounding is a special process in which we blend medications with kid-friendly flavors, like:

• Apple
• Grape
• Chocolate
• Cherry
• Mint
• Banana

These flavors are sourced from special ingredients that are extensively tested to ensure they won’t trigger harmful interactions or interfere with the drug itself. Medicine flavoring is also generally hypo-allergenic or at least far less likely to trigger a reaction than the foods most parents use to mask medicine at home.

In most cases, the pharmacist will create your child’s medicine from scratch or break it down and mix it into the flavoring before you take it home. Medicine flavoring can be added to almost any oral dose format, but are much more common in liquid medicines.

There are some instances where you may be able to request the addition of flavoring to an existing prescription you already have. Whether or not this is possible really depends on the drug and how much of the prescription you have left.

How Medicine Flavoring Works

There are three main “problem flavors” associated with most medications and drugs children take:

• Saltiness
• Sourness
• Bitterness

These are, of course, the flavors they complain about the most, too. And really, who can blame them? It’s no fun feeling sick or unwell and having to try and swallow something that tastes awful!

Like colors on the color wheel, saltiness, sourness, and bitterness all have an opposite “contrasting” flavor that softens them and makes them seem less pronounced. That means we can’t just add your child’s favorite flavor into every medicine and call it a day.

We’ll tell you how it all works, and which flavors work best for each particular problem, in the next few sections.

Eliminating Saltiness

Saltiness in medications generally comes from one of two sources.

• Either the medication itself contains some form of sodium
• Or it contains specific inorganic compounds known to carry a salty flavor.

To mask salty flavors, pharmacies generally turn to sweet, fruity flavors like strawberry, raspberry, orange, cherry, or watermelon. In most cases, they are simulated or artificial flavors; real citrus often affects drug absorption rates. Still, they are just as tasty and just as safe whether they’re real or made in a lab.

Have a kid who can’t stand fruit? Other options, including butterscotch, caramel, and maple, might work out better. These options tend to work better for drugs that are extremely salty, too. If you aren’t sure which your child will prefer, ask your pharmacist to create a drug-free sample for your little one to taste!

Eliminating Sourness

Some medications are sour, rather than salty. This is a result of the base ingredients being more acidic. You’ll know this is the case if you give your child their medicine and they immediate make that well-known puckered-up face!

Here, too, sweetness can be very helpful. But some fruit flavorings, such as lemon and orange, may actually make the problem worse. That’s because many fruit flavorings contain citric acid, which is also slightly sour.

Other fruits (either artificially created or naturally) contain fewer acids, making them a better choice for eliminating sourness almost across the board. These fruits include:

• Raspberry
• Cherry
• Tangerine
• Pineapple
• Mango

Xanthan gum can also help to reduce or mask sourness in a particularly sour formula or medicine. It works by creating a colloidal coating over the tongue, preventing acidic ingredients from making contact with the taste buds.

Eliminating Bitterness

Many kids find bitterness the most challenging flavor of all. Unlike saltiness or sourness, there’s just not much redeeming about it and there’s really no “adapting to the taste” with it, either. This may be a direct result of the fact that humans evolved the ability to sense bitterness as a defense mechanism against poisonous foods.

Bitterness is usually present in medicines containing certain polyhydroxy compounds, including alkaloids, amides, and amino acids. This usually includes drugs containing:

• Caffeine
• Codeine
• Levothyroxine
• Tylenol
• Ibuprofen

Certain blood pressure drugs, heart rhythm drugs, and antibiotics may carry a bitter flavor, too.

The go-to flavor here is also sweetness, but because bitterness is so difficult to cover, it has to be especially sweet in order to be effective. Some of the fruity flavors used to mask saltiness or sourness, including raspberry, orange, lemon, mango, and pineapple, just don’t work.

The latter two may even enhance a bitter flavor. That’s bad news, since it can actually make the bitter flavor stronger and much less palatable.

So what does work?

Chocolate, mint, tangerine, marshmallow, caramel, and banana creme. If your child has ever been prescribed a liquid antibiotic like amoxicillin, they’ve probably had the banana flavor already – it’s very distinct.

Common Questions from Parents

What Is Medicine Flavoring and Compounding?

It is a special process done in a compounding pharmacy to improve the taste of children’s medicine by blending medications with kid-friendly flavors.

Why Does Medicine Taste Bad to Kids?

There are three reasons, or “problem flavors” associated with children’s medications. They are: saltiness, bitterness, and sourness. But with compounding, you can reduce these three issues.

Are Flavorings Safe?

Yes, there are thousands of potential ingredients that may mask bad flavors in medication. Because of this, your pharmacist can work directly with your child’s needs.

What’s In Those Medicine Flavorings, Anyway?

Parents often have questions about the kind of flavorings we use in children’s medicine.

• Are they safe?
• Do they contain a lot of sugar?
• Are they filled with potentially harmful dyes that might make your child hyperactive?

In truth, there are thousands of potential ingredients that can mask a flavor. Some of these are naturally-sourced from existing fruit or foods (e.g., tangerine oil or mango powder) while others are artificially created in a lab. Some medicine flavorings are high in sugar, while others are actually sugar-free.

Worried about artificial flavors? This mostly stems from a misunderstanding of science, as pharmaceutical flavorings are rigorously tested for safety before they ever even reach the pharmacy. Still, you can request the pharmacist use only natural ingredients if you have a preference.

Conclusion

This diversity of options might make flavor compounding seem complicated, but it is important because it allows us to find unique solutions to special needs.

Still, it does mean there’s no easy way to tell you what works best for every patient or every situation. For that, your best bet is to reach out to your pharmacist for a personal medication review.