Rancho Bernardo Surgery Center
makes medication preparation a
constant area of focus, says Stephanie
McIntosh, RN, administrator
for the San Diego, California-based
ASC. “Keeping it at the forefront
of everyone’s mind is what keeps us
vigilant with following regulations
and proper practices.”
That needs to be the mindset of
an ASC or mistakes are likely to
occur, says Marcia Patrick, RN, a
Tacoma, Washington-based infection
prevention and control consultant
and surveyor for the Accreditation
Association for Ambulatory Health
Care (AAAHC). “The Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) has a long list of outbreaks that
can be attributed to unsafe medication
preparation practices. This is an
area ASCs must be concerned about
because of the potential for direct patient harm, such as transmission of
infectious diseases.”
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services (CMS) and accreditation
surveyors also closely scrutinize
the area of medication preparation,
says Alyssa Whitmore, ASC account
manager for Lake Forest, Illinoisbased
PharMEDium, a provider of
pharmacy-outsourced, ready-to-use
sterile compounded preparations. “In most instances, if you are not following
the standards and nationally recognized
guidelines for safe injection
practices, surveyors will definitely
cite you.”