The total cost of the telepharmacy equipment was just more than $27,000 and will save more than $106,500 annually. Funding was provided in part by a payout from the dissolution of the Western Plains Health Consortium, in part by the LDRH Foundation, with the remainder covered by contingency funding.A smaller blurb with much less info was also printed in the Prairie Business Magazine out of North Dakota.
The telepharmacy unit’s home setting, which is in LDRH, has two high-resolution digital cameras: One observes the activity of the pharmacy tech. The other allows the pharmacy tech at LDRH to display the medication, the label and the physician order so the medication dispensed can be visualized in real time by the pharmacist located in Spearfish or Rapid City.
The system also allows the pharmacist and pharmacy tech to have a visual/audio conversation.
“A pharmacist does not have to be on site,” Smith said. “It saves us significant personnel expenses in pharmacy wages.”
Monday, October 05, 2009
South Dakota hospital pilots telepharmacy program
The Lawrence County Journal fills us in with an article on the new telepharmacy pilot project in South Dakota's Lead-Deadwood Regional Hospital:
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An update on this in the Northern Black Hills Weekly News:
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Another innovation is the telepharmacy station in the hospital. A pharmacy tech, such as Marilyn Schwaner, can dispense medications without the physical presence of a pharmacist. LDRH is tied visually through an uplink to the Spearfish Regional Hospital pharmacy. Pharmacists there can oversee a draw of medications and can communicate with voice commands. “It’s a wonderful invention,” Schwaner said.
Smith said that in the past, there were limited hours for a pharmacist to be on site in Deadwood to distribute patient medications. Technicians such as Schwaner had a small window of time to have prescriptions ready and if something was prescribed outside of the special hours, Schwaner would have to send out for the meds to another Regional facility.
Now, Schwaner can dispense medications throughout the day, as needed. “It has increased our hours of access and reduced costs,” Smith said.
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