Is anyone willing to share their policy on pain management that has been updated with the March CMS S&C instructions about IV opioids (monitoring, assessment, etc)?  We are working on ours.

Thank you!

Our facility is implementing the new Hospira Sapphire pump (replacing the recalled GemStar).  The pump has 'smart' technology and I am in the process of building the drug library.  Is anyone using this pump for pain management and/or epidural infusions?  I would love to talk to someone about how they built their library. 

Thanks!

Laura Herbrechtsmeier

I have seen a growing trend for health-systems to extend their automatic stop order (ASO) policy for routine/maintenance medications beyond 30 days.  Some have even elimated ASOs altogether.  This seems reasonable if prescribers are thoroughly reviewing the active med list on a daily basis.  In my experience, this review is not done consistently and/or accurately.  What is the ASO policy at your institution?  I will be happy to compile responses and return to participants in this forum topic.

Please see article on feeding tube system changes (new connectors) in this morning's ISMP newsletter.  Really important that med safety officers stay on top of this. Finding that many of our colleagues are unaware of the forthcoming changes starting 4th quarter this year.  Here's the article. Drop into browser.

http://www.ismp.org/newsletters/acutecare/showarticle.aspx?id=86

Mike

I am sure you all groaned when you saw the subject line!

I would love to hear some advice on how to handle U-500 insulin patients who insist on using their own insulin in the hospital.

For those of you who are utilizing inpatient CPOE, do you still have prescription pads available for providers to hand-write prescriptions ?  Thanks in advance for any comments or suggestions, Rebecca

I am searching for a policy on how your organization handles High Alert medications in the OR setting with Anesthesia. Please provide your High Alert policy detailing this process. In addition, do you have a risk assessment document I can have?

Questions:

Does Anesthesia follow the same process as nursing on the patient floors?

Is Anesthesia exempt from the High Alert process in the OR setting?

Does Anesthesia follow their own internal process that is reference in your High Alert policy?

Thank you.  Joe

Joseph T. Moss, Jr., PharmD, MBA

Hi everyone,

we have a patient who came in with an infected intrathecal baclofen pump. it was removed yesterday and today patient went into withdrawal. he is currently being managed with oral baclofen and pain doc inserted a new intrathecal catheter to be hooked up to Alaris pump to run at 15 micrograms/hr not to exceed 300 micrograms per day or 4 ml/hr. I am having trouble finding dilution and stability info.

Any experience with this is appreciated!!

thank you,
Melissa

We recently implemented Epic and have seen an increase in our drug/drug as well as therapeutic duplications. Does anyone have a protocol or policy they would be willing to share giving pharmacists the authority to discontinue certain medications without contacting the provider?

Hello,