Medication interventions get a boost from a powerful tool: "Pharmacists
can improve patient outcomes by following 3 major functions: identification of
potential and actual medication-related problems (MRPs), resolution of actual
MRPs, and prevention of potential MRPs.
The best way to achieve these goals is through accurate documentation, and one
of the chief obstacles to this is time—or rather the lack of it."
Read the full article from Formulary.
In This Issue...
Sentri7 Customers Far
Outperform Other U.S. Hospitals in Core Measure Improvements
Sentri7
can find patients that may have had a heart attack or heart failure and check
to ensure they are taking aspirin, beta blockers or other preventative
treatment required by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) quality
measures.
"We were having trouble with core measures in educating congestive heart
failure patients because they were being admitted with different complaints,"
said Steve Bethea, Pharmacy Director at University of South Alabama Medical
Center. "Sentri7 is able to query for patients on medications that would
typically be prescribed for a CHF patient. We can then verify with the
physician whether or not the patient has CHF, and if so, we will provide the
education and document the activity in the patient's medical record."
According to the most recently updated Hospital Compare data, the average
score change across all hospitals reporting quality measures was 0.711%, with
the highest average increase of 2.79% for measure PN-7, Percent of Pneumonia
Patients Assessed and Given Influenza Vaccination.
Meanwhile, Sentri7 customers showed improvements of up to 16 to 34% on
measure PN-7. This is about six times better than the national averages. The system identifies patients with a pneumonia diagnosis and
checks their medication history to see if they've had a flu shot. Using this
process The UMass Memorial Medical Center improved their score by 26%.
"Sentri7 has improved our ability to proactively identify core measure
compliance issues where medications are involved," said Christian Hartman,
PharmD, MBA Medication Safety Officer at The UMass Memorial Medical Center.
"Sentri7 generates lists of patients that require our immediate attention so
we can focus our efforts and improve our publicly reported compliance rates."
Read the full press release.
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Two Upcoming Webinars:
"From 22% to 0% Pharmacist Turnover, How Benefis Health System Did It" and "USP
797: De-mystifying Beyond-Use Dating"
In
"From 22% to 0% Pharmacist Turnover, How Benefis Health System Did It"
(Thursday, October 29th) Benefis Health System describes their multi-faceted
approach to improving retention and recruitment. From 2000-2002, the turnover
rate averaged 22% yearly. From 2003-2005 this decreased to an average of 4.7%
yearly. For the last two consecutive years, the turnover rate has been 0%.
Register for this
webinar.
Determining beyond-use dating (BUD) continues to vex pharmacists and
technicians and is one of the most frequently asked questions of the chapter. In "USP
797: De-mystifying Beyond-Use Dating" (Wednesday, November 18th) Eric S. Kastango,
MBA, RPh, FASHP, will review will review beyond-use dating and the
requirements as they apply to USP 797.
Register for this webinar.
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Recent Webinars On-Demand:
"The Joint Commission Medication Management Update for Pharmacists" and "BCMA vs.
CPOE, Which Comes First?"
In "The Joint Commission Medication Management Update for Pharmacists"
Darryl S. Rich, Pharm.D., M.B.A., FASHP, Surveyor for The Joint Commission,
presented what pharmacists need to know going in to 2010. DISCLAIMER:
Please note that this presentation is current as of 10/14/09. The Joint
Commission reserves the right to change the content of the information as
appropriate. View
on-demand webinar.
In "Pharmacy Face-Off: BCMA vs. CPOE, Which Comes First?" John
Poikonen took on Steven Rough in our first "pharmacy face-off." Pharmacists
debated on Bar Code Medication Administration or Computerized Physician Order
Entry and which should be implemented first. Who won?
View the on-demand
webinar.
Have you missed any of our other past free webinars? Check out the
webinar archive to view on-demand recorded versions and download
presentation slides.
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St. Luke's Hospital -
Expanding the role of the pharmacist
|
 |
St. Luke's Hospital - Bethlehem Campus is the main campus of
St. Luke's Hospital & Health Network. Leslie Johnson is the Clinical
Coordinator and has been using Quantifi and UnitStock since 2006. In this
interview she explains how Quantifi helped expand the role of the
pharmacists and UnitStock makes their inspection process paperless across
the four-hospital system. |
Pharmacy OneSource: How has Quantifi helped the pharmacy
department at your facility?
Leslie Johnson: Quantifi has allowed us to track the interventions
that are being completed by our pharmacists. Additionally, in the past year
we have begun to develop clinical services at our main campus. Quantifi has
allowed us to show Senior Leadership the impact that pharmacists, and in
particular clinical pharmacists, can have. Our three other sites also have
and use Quantifi. Quantifi has helped us to justify the expansion of
clinical services both by adding pharmacists and expanding the roles of
current pharmacists. Additionally it has helped all of our pharmacists get
excited about documenting what they are doing. Each site provides a small
reward to the top "Quantifier" each quarter. This has inspired some
competition between staff members and has lead to an increase in
documentation.
Pharmacy OneSource: What do you like best about Quantifi?
Leslie Johnson: I like that it can be customized to fit an individual
site's need. We are a four-hospital network and each site has different
services and needs. We can build interventions to fit what they are doing
and hide interventions that are not applicable at that time. I also like
that the application is web based. This means that our pharmacists can
access it anywhere within our facility or even in our off-site clinics.
Pharmacy OneSource: How has UnitStock helped the pharmacy department
at your facility?
Leslie Johnson: UnitStock allows us to organize and track our
inspections and has helped to minimize the amount of paper we need to keep.
The real-time reporting and ability to pull up reports via the web is also
helpful. All of our sites also use the e-mail function to send the completed
inspections directly to the unit manager for electronic filing, creating a
truly paperless system.
Read the full interview.
Get more information on
Quantifi and
UnitStock.
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Frye Regional Medical Center
Selects Simplifi 797 to Increase Safety for Drug Compounding
Frye Regional Medical Center has adopted
Simplifi 797 quality assurance
software to simplify meeting all of the requirements of USP Chapter 797 for
compounding sites throughout the hospital.
"Making sure that the pharmacy is following the correct procedures in
compounding sterile products (products given through injections or infusions)
protects our patients from infections," said Marc Hughes, RPh, MBA,
Administrative Director of Pharmacy Services at Frye Regional Medical Center.
"This program aids us in compliance with USP 797 rules on sterile compounding,
but more importantly keeps our patients safe."
Simplifi 797 is a web-based application that automates, integrates and
streamlines the quality activities and documentation required to meet the U.S.
Pharmacopeia's Chapter 797 best practice guidelines. Simplifi 797 manages task
scheduling for environmental monitoring and automates the reporting of
exceptions and compliance.
Hughes said the Simplifi 797 program does the following for Frye Regional
Medical Center:
- Provides off-site storage for record keeping for temperatures, humidity
readings, and staff competencies
- Provides accurate and easily retrievable record keeping for tasks and
competencies with reminders
- Reminds staff of daily, weekly, and monthly duties
- Helps "go green" environmentally by eliminating paper waste for record
keeping
- Allows better control over seeing which tasks are completed or not
completed
View the Simplifi 797 video demo.
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Contact Us
To request additional information on our products or services, please
contact our sales department at 800-654-8395 or
sales@pharmacyonesource.com.
Product information can also be found on our website at
PharmacyOneSource.com.
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