As an increasing amount of urban hospitals begin to implement healthcare IT solutions, smaller, more rural hospitals are beginning to follow suit. Rustic hospitals are now beginning to see the advantages of telepharmacy technology, including 24/7 coverage, faster workflow, and decreased paper usage.
No one knows this better than Greg Guimond. Greg Guimond is the Director of Pharmacy at Claxton Medical Center, a small 102-bed hospital located in Ogdensburg, NY. He says that telepharmacy technology has saved his hospital a lot of time, money, and effort.
“With the old paper format, the doctor writes the order on the form, the nurse will acknowledge the order and later picks up the order and it was a labor-intensive, time-consuming order entry process. Now the physician enters it, the pharmacy and the nursing staff can see the order is in the system and the nurse is available to administer it. The turnaround time from physician order to the patient getting the medication is much quicker. And, I think those who have fully embraced it have found it to be a more efficient workflow.”
But he’s not the only one who is impressed by the system. Kelly Meeks, Director of Pharmacy at Crawford Memorial Hospital, is also an avid supporter of telepharmacy technology. Her hospital, located out of Robinson, Illinois, adopted a computerized physician order entry (CPOE) system back in 2008.
Three years later, in 2011, Crawford Memorial Hospital partnered with PipelineRx to deploy a telepharmacy platform solution.
“With the medication turnaround time, the order goes right to the e-queue and you know right away that the orders are there and the turnaround times are quite fast,” Meeks stated.
Just two years later, in 2013, Crawford Memorial Hospital decided to expand its CPOE system to the emergency room department. The hospital continues to see improved workflow processes to this day.
To learn more about the use of telepharmacy technology in rural hospitals, click here.