My question concerns medication barcode scanning. Specifically, the problem we are encountering involves scanning of products where there are multiple barcodes present on a single product. For instance, a batched IV product will have the manufacturer’s barcode, batch label barcode, and the patient specific barcode which is placed on the product before being dispensed from the pharmacy. We are a Cerner health system and charge on dispense. We utilize the patient-specific barcode for crediting if needed. We are re-evaluating this process in an effort to eliminate confusion and improve patient safety.
Does anyone use a specific barcode formatting to encourage nurses to preferentially scan one barcode versus the other, or is the focus more on nursing education?
Has anyone found a better way to do credits or utilize some different method to do credits?
Thank you,
Brett J. Pierce, PharmD
PGY1 Pharmacy Resident
Department of Pharmacy
Northwestern Memorial Hospital
251 E Huron, Suite LC-700
Chicago, Illinois 60611
312.926.0751 (phone)
312.250.6473 (pager)
312.926.7956 (fax)
bpierce@nmh.org
www.northwesternmedicine.org