Pharmacy resource management — three methods to assess individual patient drug costs

Abstract

Abstract Resource management has important implications for pharmacy, and methods of costing drugs to individual patients require evaluation as part of this approach. Three systems of allocating medication costs to individual patients have been examined in a study over a year on one medical and one surgical ward at Freeman hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne. These systems were investigated in three phases: (i) calculation of average cost per bed occupied day, using existing data; (ii) retrospective collection of data from prescription charts; (iii) data capture at the time of administration. The first approach gave variable and insensitive data about medication costs. Although having little effect on workload, it had no clear potential for resource management. The second phase evaluated two methods for calculation of drug costs from medication records after discharge. The system accounted for less than 70 per cent of drug costs, and poor staff acceptability, and was time-consuming to administer with no additional benefits. The third phase captured data via lightpens, with bar codes identifying patient and drug. Between 66 per cent and 93 per cent of issues were recorded accurately by this system. Advantages included computerised ordering with subsequent time-savings and improvement in stock control. The system has clear potential for use in clinical audit and drug utilisation review