Medications used during surgery could be putting your patients at risk and increasing your facility and practitioner liability. Are you using Sugammadex (Bridion®) or Aprepitant (Emend®)? If so, are you providing education on discharge to your female patients about the potential increased risk of pregnancy?
The race to the first Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved COVID19 vaccine is on, but is the answer that easy? Probably not, but we all have high hopes for returning to the “normal” world we once knew. Although we are all hoping for a one hundred percent effective vaccine with life-long immunity, reality may be completely different.
With new COVID-19 outbreaks occurring across the country and the world, the concern for drug shortages is heightened. What drugs are impacted and how do they affect your organization? Do you have a contingency plan in place to deal with unexpected shortages? Work with your consultant pharmacist to resolve these issues quickly and efficiently so that patient safety and your day-to-day operations are not impacted.
Safe injection practices are one of the most commonly cited deficiencies by certification and accreditation agencies. But there is good news, your consultant pharmacist can help you avoid deficiencies! Here are the ten commonly cited issues and my recommendations for survey success.
Fireworks can be great this time of year, but as a consultant pharmacist, I don’t like to hear fireworks when it comes to surveys. Some deficiencies are fairly common and avoiding them is not that difficult. Today we will discuss three of the most common deficiencies in ambulatory surgery centers and ways to avoid them.
Implementing, and adhering to, good infection control practices is critical to minimizing the impact of infectious diseases, including, but not limited to COVID-19. As a consultant pharmacist, I see additional opportunities for infection control practices that may not be as obvious as handwashing or PPE.
June is National Safety Month and at OctariusRx we recognize and support the National Safety Council’s efforts to build and advocate for a culture of safety.
Consultant pharmacists are medication management specialists who work in a variety of settings like ambulatory surgery centers (ASC), senior care facilities (e.g., nursing homes, assisted living facilities) and also by helping individual patients. These pharmacists provide expert advice on pharmaceutical services, patient safety, and drug therapy management.
In a three-part series, we will discuss how a consultant pharmacist can benefit each client and how you can find the right consultant pharmacist for your needs. This month, we’ll focus on how ASCs can enhance patient safety by using an expert consultant pharmacist. In the coming months, this series will also discuss how consultant pharmacists can have a dramatic impact on long-term care facilities and on individual patients’ lives.
This year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) One & Only Campaign turns ten years old. The One & Only Campaign, as you may know, focuses on eliminating unsafe injection practices. In the span of a single decade, healthcare facilities across the country have come a long way in improving patient safety via safe injection practices — but: there is still much work to be done.
Vaccines have greatly reduced the burden of infectious diseases and they play a critical role in managing public health today. The benefits of vaccination extend far beyond prevention of specific diseases in individuals to the protection of entire societies. For vaccines to achieve their best results, however, they must be handled, stored and administered correctly. Do you know the best way to store vaccines? Is your healthcare facility following best practices for vaccine storage?
