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BRIDGE-BAR CODE POINT-OF-CARE SYSTEM
No one intends to commit a medication error—most people never know when they do. Since hospitals cannot correct what cannot be seen, we at St. Edward Mercy Medical Center provide clinicians tools to automate the identification and tracking of  actual and near-miss medication events. Bridge, a bar code point-of-care system, is one tool that St. Edward Mercy Medical Center uses to automate the collection of medication administration data.
The Bridge system is a decision-support software application that runs on point-of-care computing devices. To ensure the safe delivery of medications, this system receives patient information upon admission, transfer, and discharge. The system also receives medication orders that have been reviewed by a licensed pharmacist and any allergy information that is available in the pharmacy information system. Bridge employs bar code scanning devices to automate the identification of the patient, caregiver, and medication. Using Bridge, the clinician scans his or her name badge to log onto the system then scans the patient’s identification band to access the patient’s profile. Finally, the bar-coded medication is scanned to verify that the “five rights” of medication administration – right drug, right patient, right dose, right time, and right route – are as ordered by the physician. Bridge automatically and accurately documents the medication administration even into the hospitals medication administration record. Bridge records all data on medication administration events.
All medications that are made available to the clinician are either labeled with a manufacturer bar code, or are bar-coded in the pharmacy using bar code stickers or repackaged with bar codes. All bar codes are mapped in Bridge to the correct medication by a licensed pharmacist. This is an important safety step to ensure that the correct drug is identified when scanned by the clinician. Anytime the clinician scans the medication bar code and receives a warning from Bridge for incorrect medication, incorrect dose, incorrect time, patient allergy, etc, the clinician is given the opportunity to cancel the administration. All warnings as well as the action taken by the clinician are recorded in Bridge. Reports are routinely reviewed in order to identify issues. These issues are analyzed, and steps are taken to improve the drug delivery system in order to avoid such events in the future.
Bridge has been in use for about a year now. Bridge has made a positive difference in the quality of care for our patients. Not only are clinicians provided with an excellent tool to augment their clinical judgment, we now have the data we need to identify areas for improvement. The Bridge bar code verification system helps St. Edward Mercy Medical Center ensure that we are providing the best and safest care possible to our patients.
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