Suicide Precautions Patients

PLEASE NOTE:   Posts made to this forum should not be considered as the expressed opinions of, nor should be considered endorsed by, the Medication Safety Officer’s Society (MSOS) or the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP). 

Make sure your email is up-to-date
In order to continue to receive updates from MSOS, as well as forum posts and other valuable information as a member of MSOS, please be sure to update your email address with us, whenever it changes. If you need assistance doing so, please send an email to jrufo@ismp.org

1 post / 0 new
Julie Botsford
Julie Botsford's picture
Offline
Last seen: 4 months 3 weeks ago
Joined: 08/07/2009 - 10:54
Suicide Precautions Patients

We recently had a patient on suicide precautions who was on a fentanyl patch, which was disposed of incorrectly (in the trash vs. fold and flush).  The concern was raised about the availability of concentrated drug to be ingested in this manner.  As we thought more deeply, we became concerned about any topical patch used in this patient population.  Anything could be ingested causing an overdose.

 

Have any of you addressed this?  Do you utilize a suicide precaution checklist that might incorporate this?