Cardinal Health, the leading provider of products and services supporting the health-care industry, today showcased its medication technologies that offer hospitals a comprehensive program to manage all medications ? from pharmacy to nursing to the point of care.
At the 41st Mid-Year Clinical Meeting and Exhibition for the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP), Cardinal Health highlighted how it can help hospitals protect and manage medication through key technologies and services from its diverse set of business units. Cardinal Health supports the entire process with inventory and logistics management services, unit-dose packaging, order management, secure access and selection, verification, administration and documentation for all medications, including IVs, which represent 61 percent of the most serious and costly medication errors. Through the collection and analysis of data, Cardinal Health can also help hospitals identify opportunities for medication safety best practices and rapid productivity improvements.
?Cardinal Health wants to help hospitals realize the full potential of a simpler, safer and more effective medication management process,? said Mark Rosenbaum, president of Integrated Provider Solutions for Cardinal Health. ?Cardinal Health is the only company that can provide an end-to-end solution, which means health-care organizations can continue to leverage their investment in our enterprise-wide medication management technologies and services as we continue to introduce new, integrated product offerings.?
Cardinal Health?s comprehensive medication management approach is made possible by combining several of the company?s offerings, including the following new products and services:
ReadyScan?: A new service to improve patient safety by providing hospitals with pharmaceuticals in unit-of-use packages, complete with bar codes that help clinicians verify medications at the bedside.
Care Fusion?: The recent Cardinal Health acquisition of Care Fusion?, an industry leader in bedside wireless, barcode-enabled patient identification systems that provide a last line of defense against medical errors at the most critical point ? the patient.
Next Generation Alaris? PC Unit: The next-generation product offers wireless connectivity to the hospital?s existing IT infrastructure and provides a common user interface for programming infusions and monitoring, to help reduce IV complexity at the point of care.
The new products and services build upon the existing capabilities from Cardinal Health?s industry-leading Alaris? infusion safety systems and Pyxis? automation technologies, which form the foundation of the company?s offerings that help reduce medication complexity and simplify the medication management process.
?The true power of what Cardinal Health brings to our customers comes from the intersection of offerings that positively impact patient safety and hospital operating efficiencies,? Rosenbaum added.
The company also highlighted recent efforts to improve patient safety at hospitals across the country through its partnerships with hospitals to provide pharmacy management services and through the Cardinal Health Center for Safety and Clinical Excellence.
McLeod Regional Medical Center has received recent accolades for dramatic improvements in patient safety by implementing virtually all of the recommendations for the recent Institute of Medicine report. McLeod partnered with Cardinal Health, who manages more than 240 hospital pharmacies nationwide, for pharmacy management and to implement new technologies and programs, including automated medication management, bar coding, electronic medication profiles and a drug reconciliation program, as part of an interdisciplinary approach to reducing medication errors.
In addition, Cardinal Health?s Center for Safety and Clinical Excellence was a primary supporter of a regional task force to improve patient safety by eliminating variation in intravenous (IV) medication practices among hospitals in San Diego County.