Labelling Software Eliminates Drug Error Risks

Norprint Labelling Systems has developed a new piece of drug labelling software, which it claimed will help to vastly reduce the risk of error in the preparation and administration of cytoxic drugs.

Norprint Labelling Systems has developed a new piece of drug labelling software, which it claimed will help to vastly reduce the risk of error in the preparation and administration of cytoxic drugs.

Meditrax has been designed by Norprint to offer full worksheet pairing (printing labels and worksheets together) for the preparation of chemotherapy drugs required by aseptic services departments.

The software package was initially developed by Norprint's in-house software development team to meet the requirements of a health care trust client, which wanted to improve current labelling systems and manage the risk of error.

The software is available stand-alone or can form part of a complete labelling system consisting of a thermal transfer printer, ribbon, bespoke labels and support contracts, where required.

After successfully trialling the project with the client, Norprint said it saw how the package could work for any aseptic department, which required a secure drugs labelling and worksheet preparation system.

Now fully developed, the package is claimed to enable institutions to protect their systems and data from accidental viewing or modification and also provides a secure audit trail of all actions taken within the system.

That is achieved by a multi-level user group authorisation process, which enables all files in the system to be password protected, with various levels of security access.

Sarah Lingard, Norprint's software developer, who helped to create the new software package commented: "By helping a client we have developed a groundbreaking new product, which can provide bespoke drugs administration and labelling for medical and pharmaceutical institutions worldwide.

When developing the product, we wanted to reduce the risk factors in the prescription labelling process: illegibility; confusion over information; label degradation, insecure database access; insufficient auditing procedures and misidentification." One client already using the drug labelling software is Yeovil District Hospital, which has incorporated the system to allow it to safely label and dispense chemotherapy drugs.

"The new system has increased our security levels, whilst allowing more people to use the system and we also now have the ability to store and retrieve data - which dramatically reduces the time taken to prepare worksheets and labels for prescription requirements.

Before contacting Norprint, we looked at several 'off the shelf' packages but none of the other companies were prepared to sit down and work with us or amend their packages to work with our specific needs," explained Sandie Potepa of Yeovil District Hospital.

A demonstration CD of Meditrax is available from Norprint.

Back to top