11- Distribution of Drugs in the Ward
We need a very easy system that allows us to
know immediately:
- If a patient takes his/her drugs or not.
- If a patient has too many drugs to take.
- Which drugs a patient has received since he arrived in the ward, for how
many days he has taken such drugs, and for how long he has not been taking
others that are no longer suitable…
- A "one step" organization between order and distribution of
drugs (more steps means more chances to make mistakes…). And
an easy way to follow orders with workers who do not read or write easily
in the Roman alphabet (just a few words: the name of drugs).
The system we use needs:
- A "drug cart" (oxx004)
- Two "drug order folders," each to cover half the beds in the
ward (oxx003).
Two is better to allow workers to distribute drugs for half of the ward
while you are still ordering for the other half (Only one step between ordering
and distributing means we can not make a second "hardware step"
between orders and distribution!)
- A specific drug order form (oxx001). (To download the prototype of form: "prototype“)
- One red pen, one blue pen and one liquid corrector pen for people who
order drugs and only one pen for people giving drugs. (Order in red
for "before food," blue for "after food" (photo of example oxx005))
- The help nurse distributes the drugs from the drug cart using the "drug
order folder" and draws a cross on a patient's drug order page each
time patient doesn't take a drug.
- For injectable drugs it is better to add a white board in the ward, and
another "injectable drug order folder" is needed. Injectable
drugs are never written in the normal drug order folders, and vice versa.
- For TB management see also "TB"
See also "Introduction"
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