Open AccessEvaluation of Drug Wastage in the Operating Rooms and Intensive Care Units of a Regional Health Service
Author(s) -
Federico Barbariol,
Cristian Deana,
Francesca Lucchese,
G Cataldi,
Flavio Bassi,
Tiziana Bove,
Luigi Vetrugno,
Amato De Monte
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
anesthesia and analgesia/anesthesia and analgesia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.404
H-Index - 201
eISSN - 1526-7598
pISSN - 0003-2999
DOI - 10.1213/ane.0000000000005457
Subject(s) - medicine , observational study , intensive care , pharmacy , emergency medicine , medical emergency , health care , service (business) , intensive care medicine , nursing , economy , pathology , economics , economic growth
Pharmacological treatments for critical processes in patients need to be initiated as rapidly as possible; for this reason, it is a standard of care to prepare the main anesthesia and emergency drugs in advance. As a result, 20%-50% of the prepared drugs remain unused and are then discarded. Decreasing waste by optimizing drug use is an attractive strategy for meeting both cost containment and environmental sustainability. The primary end point of this study was to measure the actual amount of drug wastage in the operating rooms (ORs) and intensive care units (ICUs) of a Regional Health Service (RHS). The secondary end point was to analyze and estimate the economic implications of this waste for the Health Service and to suggest possible measures to reduce it.