Dose Standardization of Oral Liquid Medications in a Pediatric Hospital

Abstract

Standardizing oral liquid medications in a pediatric hospital reduces errors and costs by reducing the number of different doses and preparation time required to compound medications. The Institute of Medicine recommends that hospitals implement standard processes for medication doses, timing, and scales in a given patient care unit.¹² Using a standardized dose, based on therapeutic ranges within the weight-based dosing, allows for a reduction in the number of doses compounded. In this study, data from the daily usage of oral medications were evaluated. The top 20% of the oral liquid medications were evaluated to determine the medications with the most doses (assuming that 80% of the doses are controlled by 20% of the medications). The dosage range for each medication was determined and a spreadsheet was used to calculate and predict a standard dose. The standard doses reduced the number of similar doses ordered from 329 to 59. Standardizing doses reduced wastage by 90% and resulted in departmental saving of $15,000.