Baxa DoseEdge upgrade features many key improvements

Baxa Corp. has released a significant upgrade for its DoseEdge Pharmacy Workflow Manager, with more than 39 improvements and enhancements. Introduced to the market in December 2007 under the name IntelliFlowRx, DoseEdge has processed more than 5 million doses since the first hospital pharmacy began preparing patient doses with it in March 2008. Using barcode technology, DoseEdge verifies the use of correct drugs, diluents, and concentrations in the compounding of intravenous (IV), chemo, total parenteral nutrition, and oral liquid doses. Baxa said the management tool has prevented more than 100,000 preparation errors.

Larry Gibson

The original formulary contained approximately 5,000 IV and chemotherapy drug products. This new software release, version 2010.2, adds 9,000 oral liquid products; e.g., common antibiotics, such as vancomycin, that are available in oral suspension for those who have trouble swallowing pills, especially children; and low-dose oral chemotherapy, which is used for certain types of cancers and can help reduce side effects. Larry Gibson, senior product manager, told Drug Topics, “In each case, DoseEdge confirms that the dose was made using the correct amount of the correct drug at the correct concentration, and that beyond-use dates are accurately ascribed.”

In addition to enhanced patient safety, users of the DoseEdge upgrade should expect to see cost benefits. “One example,” Gibson said, “is the reduction of waste that is offered by the ability to safely reuse a dose that has been returned to the pharmacy. DoseEdge knows everything about the returned dose and can therefore accept or reject its use for another patient based on its contents and/or expiration.” In addition, he said, Baxa offers a discount on every oral liquid dose processed by DoseEdge for customers who purchase Baxa ExactaMed dispensers for their oral dose administration needs.

Expanding on how the “improved overflow handling” differs from previous versions, Gibson said, “Prior to v2010.2, DoseEdge would calculate the final volume that appears on the dose label according to formulary product concentrations. With v2010.2, DoseEdge can also retrieve this information from the Pharmacy Information System. Any differences between these 2 methods are usually the result of the pharmacy system rounding the value to a certain number of decimal places. When a specified ‘overfill’ [extra fluid that is not delivered to the patient but that is required for proper administration, such as to fill tubing or a syringe needle] is large with respect to the actual dose amount, these rounding differences can be magnified and can result in a slightly different number on the printed label. While the difference is clinically insignificant, it can create confusion and uncertainty simply because it is not an exact match. By using the information from the pharmacy system, DoseEdge maintains the precision of the amount printed on the label and also confirms that the formulary concentration is valid.”

Finally, new e-mail notifications have been added to alert users (and, in many cases, Baxa Tech Support) when the following conditions occur:

• Disk space is running low on the local server PC

• Doses are not being received by DoseEdge

• Data is not being backed up to the central server

• A dose has become available for inline or final verification

Visit www.baxa.com/doseedge/index.html for more information.