With the current devastating weather, conditions that has plagued the United States this summer the health care industry will suffer greatly. For many years the supply chain of critical medications has been shaky at best and just on the verge making a slow crawl upward, when this year’s massive storm system devastated several keys areas when it to comes to the manufacturing and distribution of medical supplies. This year storms hit major areas. Such as Florida, Texas, North Carolina and Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico has the world’s top manufacturing locations for pharmaceutical and biopharmaceuticals. It homes of 50 pharmaceutical plants for companies like Abbot, Astra Zeneca, Bristol Myers, Eli Lilly, Glaxo, Johnson and Johnson, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer and Wyeth. Puerto Rico currently holds 89 FDA license for pharmaceutical manufacturing plants. The scope of the impact is hard to determine at this time because there is clear information available what is exactly made in Puerto Rico and what manufactures have redundant manufacturing plants or products stock piled in case of events like this. The only advice that I can give anyone at this time is to do what you can to gather information on manufactures that manufacturing plants in Puerto Rico and see if you can determine what actually is made there. And see what you can do about procuring enough product to see you through several months while Puerto Rico does its best to recover.
My director has called a meeting for next week to determine criteria for IV solutions. He is wondering what other facilities are putting into place now that Baxter has enacted strict tight allocations, BBraun is not selling to anyone who was not previously buying from them , and Pfizer will be limited on how much they can supply to new customers. Any insight I can pass along?
Name of Facility: Nicholas H Noyes Memorial Hospital
I work at 2 different hospitals. So I get a lot of information from many sources. A lot of hospitals in my area are going to IV push on there antibiotics. The pharmacy is making a kit with, the antibiotic, reconstitution fluid and a syringes. Placing detailed instructions on the bag. This is considered "for immediate use" so a expiration date is not required. Also it bypasses the positive ID process. They are also going to saline well for any IV that are less than 50ml/hr. Also some facilities are hanging there bag for more than 24 hours. Most facilities have a policy in place that states that the IV needs replaced after 24 hours. I would start the process now to start conserving.
I think its going to get worse before it gets better. Sorry for all the cheery news.
Hello all from NPPA here! See new recommendations for alternative solutions to the IV Fluid Minibag shortage, as per the ECRI Institute as of January 18. (For the below link, just need to highlight and choose to "Go To" that web page directly, or copy & paste of course.)
For the most part, we have been able to manage the IV shortages moving to IV Push when possible and putting measures in place to conserve the suppplies we have. The shortage of IV sterile water caught me by surprise this week,especially since, IV bags both 1000ml and 2000ml are on backorder as well as all of the SDV.
What are your facilities doing to manage this particular shortage>
