May 23, 2003 - Cincinnati Children's Is First Pediatric Hospital to Install RxMadeSimple Prescription Management System
CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center has installed an outpatient prescription management system to improve patient safety and increase efficiency.
The web-based system was provided by RxMadeSimple, a Cincinnati-based company that provides innovative and easy-to-use systems to order medications. The system installed at Cincinnati Children's gives physicians and other authorized medical practitioners the ability to prescribe medications -- instantly and securely -- over the Internet. Since Cincinnati Children's began piloting the system in its Pediatric Primary Care Center, physicians and pharmacists have praised its patient safety features.
"There is no longer a problem with handwriting legibility, because everything is typed in," says Jack Horn, director of Pharmacy. "It's complete, it's simple, it's cost-effective and it's accurate."
At least 44,000 people, and perhaps as many as 98,000 people, die each year in hospitals as a result of medical errors that could have been prevented, according to estimates from two major studies cited in a 1999 Institute of Medicine report on medication errors. Among the report's recommendations were to implement safety systems in health care organizations to ensure safe practices at the delivery level.
Here's how the RxMadeSimple system works: When a family who receives care at the Pediatric Primary Care (PPC) Center needs a prescription refilled, they call the PPC. A representative enters the information into the system. The physician receives the information electronically, makes sure dosages are accurate and that no drug interactions can occur, and then sends it on to either Cincinnati Children's pharmacy or any other pharmacy that has a fax machine.
"This system saves us a great deal of time that can be better spent providing clinical care to children," says Greg Szumlas, MD, a physician in the PPC who has overseen the implementation of the system. "I also like how the system maintains a diary of medications, and because there are fewer people in the loop, we've also seen a reduction in turnaround time."
In fact, the time taken to refill a prescription from the family's initial call to the actual prescription being sent to the pharmacy has decreased by more than 50 percent.
"RxMadeSimple is pleased to have a role in assisting Cincinnati Children's with its quality and safety initiatives," says Rohit Nayak, co-founder of RxMadeSimple. "Our solution plays a key role in bridging the quality of care currently available in the hospital setting to the outpatient world."
Contact Information
Jim Feuer, 513-636-4656, jim.feuer@cchmc.org
