Part 1
The barcoded medication administration is a control system used by hospitals that employs bar codes in the process of distribution of medication in a bid to give the correct medication to patients. As such, it prevents instances of possible errors in medical prescriptions in health centres. They are the most common methods of automatic identification and data capture due to their simplicity, low cost, and universality. The system consists of a computer server and software, a mobile computer with WIFI, a bar code reader and printer. Every drug in the hospital has a unique bar code.
The barcode is faxed electronically when a patient has prescribed medication. In other occasions, the drug is hard delivered to a pharmacist who feeds it into the computer system (Gullett, 2015). As such, the pharmacist gives out the barcoded drug dosage to the patient’s floor. Bar code systems have primarily contributed to a reduction in medication errors as they aid in the verification of the five rights of administration of medication. The reasons are right patient, right dose, right route, right drug as well as the right time.
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Moreover, Barcode medication has aided in the management of inventory, billing streamlines, as well as saving on time at the pharmacy or home. However, the widespread adoption of BCMA has been inadequate evidence of the idea that BCMA reduces preventable medication mistakes more so to hospitals that have adopted alternative safety systems ( Bagby,2016). Computerised prescriber order entry and automated dispensing devices have over time been used instead of BCMA.
The bar code medication takes the form of 2D and 1D. The 2D barcode has square dots against the 1D bar codes that are usually seen in retail, and they have straight up and down barcodes. The 2D bar codes have more information attached to them than D. Under the provisions of the 2D barcodes; it is possible to have the expiry date of the drug as well as the batch number. At times it is easy to image a 2D bar code against a 1D. Again, 2D bar codes make use of imagers. On the other hand, 1D barcodes make use of scanners. However, the EMR vendors, include; Allscripts, Siemens, Epic, Cerner, Meditech, Heathland, McKesson, and CPSI.
Attach 2 - 3 images of hardware technology used with bar code systems
The images of hardware technology used in bar code technology are barcode label printers, system barcoding and asset tracking-barcode scanners (Gullet,2015).
Figure 1: Barcode label printers and system barcoding retrived from WaspBarcode.com
Figure 2: Asset tracking-Barcode scanners retrived from barcoding.co.uk
Part 2
Among the steps employed in bar code medication is administration are, transcription, ordering administration as well as disposition. However, some are undertaken before BCMA and those taken after BCMA (Yih, 2016). Among the steps of administering medication before BCMA are, noting down the name of the location, name and that date of the information provided. Secondly, the physician takes note of the verbal order after which he/she gives special instructions if necessary. The physician then sends the request to the pharmacists where the order is put in electronic medical storage bins prompting disposition medication. As a result, a new medication order is transcribed onto papers of the medication administration record. RN obtains supplies to enable administration of medication refrigerator on the unit. Next, RN acquires supplies to administer medication on syringe, medicine cup as well as water. Finally, the verification of patients details by use of patients identifiers and paper MAR is done together with the confirmation of the five rights of medication. On the other hand the administration of drugs after BCMA, tend to assume a similar procedure.
As such, administration of medication before BCMA provides for the initial step where a remedy is prepared for medication and which involves three activities. The activities are the dispense tablet and pills into the medicine cup. Secondly, the hanging IV of the drug which entails mixing the IV medicine powder with the solution attached, prime tubing and entering the right rate into the pump. The final step is the drawing up of liquid medication into the syringe. After BCMA the actions taken are ; scanning of the patients bar code on ID band, confirmation of new orders of the BCMA, acceptance of DCs orders BCMA, selection of the right admission and attach medication ,verification of documentation of allergy information and the documentation of the reason for not giving the scheduled medication on prior shift. Noting that the minimum number of steps in the administration of drugs before BCMA is eight while the maximum is twenty is crucial. On the other hand, the minimum number of steps in the administration of medication using BCMA is fifteen while the maximum amount is forty-eight.
References
Bagby, J. S. (2016). Errors Related to Bar Code-Assisted Medication Administration. Safety of Health IT , 55-67. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-31123-4_5
Barcode Label Printers & Systems Hardware | Scanners & Mobile Computers. (2019). Retrieved 27 August 2019, from https://www.barcoding.co.uk/barcode-printers-system-hardware/
Gullett, L. M. (2015). Bar Code Medication Administration Workarounds: A Learning Experience .
Inventory Software & System - Asset Tracking - Barcode Scanners | WaspBarcode.com. (2019). Retrieved 27 August 2019, from https://www.waspbarcode.com/
Yih, Y. (2016). Handbook of Healthcare Delivery Systems . Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
