narcotic admin. documentation
I need to know how other hospitals handle the documentation of controlled substances. Specifically, in the Icu we frequently obtain a controlled substance from the pyxis and give it to another nurse who is unable to leave her patinet to obtain it for herself. We have no mechanism to chart this, I am very interested in what other hospitals do.
Secondly, we titrate medication at the bedside frequently, and it isn't time effiecent, cost effective or always even possible to keep running back to the pyxis for a second syringe of morphine, so we have been keeping up to 10 mg at the bedside and using what we need, wasting the rest when it won't be needed for a long time. We are looking into purchasing lock boxes for our rooms. I would be interested in hearing what other hospitals do in this regard. How long can you keep a narc at the bedside, how much might you take at a time if you think you will only give 2 mgs q 5 min until patient is sedate? Thanks, we are formulating new policies emergently, as the "pandora program" has indicated signifigant deficits in our charting....