We recently had to suspend the use of J-tips filled with buffered lidocaine due to a significant number of malfunction reports. Reports ranged from the J-tip syringe cracking to what was described as "exploding" when activated. After looking into potential sources of the problem including user training, drug stability, expiration dating, and compounding pharmacies we were unable to pinpoint the problem.

1. Does your organization use J-tip for needle stick pain prevention?
2. Have you had reports of device failures?
3. Where you able to identify a root cause of the failure?

Thank you in advance for your feedback.