Full adoption of medical-grade refrigeration continues to be a priority for Hospital Pharmacists. Maintaining regulatory compliance for sensitive vaccines and medications, as well as ensuring patient safety, typically drives the decision to invest in medical-grade refrigeration.
State Departments of Health, State Boards of Pharmacy, CDC, Joint Commission and other agencies include refrigeration as part of inspections and audits. This means that Hospital Pharmacists must consider refrigerator performance in the central pharmacy as well as units used across multiple hospital locations and in medication rooms.
Pharmacy Purchasing & Products recently released results from a survey that includes information related to adoption of medical-grade refrigeration in hospital pharmacy.
 |
|
Source for Graphs: 2017 Pharmacy Product and Purchasing State of Pharmacy Automation Survey |
The Pharmacy Purchasing & Products survey contained feedback from 371 Directors of Pharmacy from US hospitals. Directors of Pharmacy were from varying parts of the country, and represented large and small facilities. The results of the survey indicate that on average 84% of hospitals have adopted medical-grade refrigeration for storage of medications and vaccines. Larger facilities, based on total number of beds, tended to have greater adoption rates of medical-grade refrigerators when compared to smaller facilities.
This survey also inquired about the brands of refrigeration in use. Helmer Scientific was named as the most commonly used brand in this survey, with 38% of respondents citing Helmer as a brand in use in their facility for pharmaceutical storage. See the complete survey from Pharmacy Purchasing & Products using this link.
