New System Improves Pharmacy Operations, Safety

The Seton Family of Hospitals’ continued patient safety efforts took another significant step this year when all pharmacies within the network began using the same pharmacy information system, PharmNet.

Bringing the rural pharmacies at Seton Edgar B Davis and Seton Highland Lakes as well as Seton Shoal Creek online with the latest software has been a long-term goal of department and network leadership. The two pharmacy applications in use at these three hospitals were outdated, had not kept pace with latest in safety improvements and required a significant amount of effort from the staff.

 “Converting all our sites to PharmNet is a great safety accomplishment,” said Shewan Aziz, director of Pharmacy for the Seton Family. “It will standardize and elevate our current level of safety while providing improvements in operational efficiency and cost effectiveness.”

Seton Shoal Creek Vice President Alan Isaacson added, “The patients we serve in this Ministry will benefit from our pharmacy system conversion.” That’s because PharmNet incorporates numerous patient safety improvements unavailable in the previous applications.

Patients and pharmacy personnel at SEBD. SHL and SSC now benefit from built-in dose range, drug-drug interaction and allergy information checking conducted automatically on all prescribed medication. In addition, the system is designed with safety in mind with features such as “tallman” letters (e.g., DOPamine and DOBUTamine) built into drug names, a best practice when managing look-alike medications/ products. Also, for the first time, patients at the rural hospitals will have 24-hour expert medication care management by remote pharmacists monitoring order entry queues after hours to verify medications.

“The use of an automated medication administration record aids in error reduction by providing clear, accurate and timely information on the medications prescribed for the patient,” said Anne LeMaistre, Seton’s chief medical information officer. “There is no question this system’s capabilities supports our commitment to safe patient care at Seton.”