On July 8, 2020, Beaumont at Worcester received a new Advanced Pharmacy PassPort™ system. The PassPort™ is a fully automated, remotely monitored, medication dispensing center. The machine dispenses single and multi-fill medication envelopes uniquely labeled with Residents’ names, room numbers, and medications. The PassPort™ securely packages and controls medications which dramatically decreases nursing time spent on “shift-to-shift” medication counts.
The new system will increase the number of medications dispensed, reduce medication waste, and decrease dependence on pharmacy deliveries, new admissions, routine medications, and more. The PassPort™ will be monitored 24/7 by Partners Pharmacy in Marlborough, MA.
Nursing staff will now have much more time to physically tend to and care for Residents. “The PassPort™ acts as a mini satellite pharmacy,” explains Debbie Freedman, director of clinical services at SALMON. “Partners Pharmacy in Marlborough loads the machine with the prescriptions and manages it,” nurses can quickly grab the medications and make their way to Residents.
“The PassPort™ helps decrease medication errors and is internally linked to our electronic medical records, so it maintains accuracy in multiple different places,” states Freedman.
Partners Pharmacy had brought the idea of implementing the PassPort™ to SALMON several years ago, thinking the organization would be a good candidate for the technology. “We’ve always had a great relationship with the pharmacy and the more we learned about the PassPort™, the better it sounded,” says Freedman. The application and acceptance take a significant amount of time because of the licensing process, adhering to room adjustments for humidity levels, and more. Freedman explains, “Very few skilled nursing centers in Massachusetts have this; we had to do a lot of work ourselves to prepare but it is absolutely worth it. We want our nurses to dedicate more of their time to caring for Residents instead of at the medication pass–this start-of-the-art technology will help immensely.”
Although the ribbon cutting ceremony had to be condensed and shortened because of COVID-19 restrictions, having the PassPort™ is still exciting. The nursing staff at Beaumont at Worcester have begun the training to use the new technology.
Freedman concludes, “We want to try to implement the PassPort™ on our other campuses as well. Now that we’re familiar with the process, we’ll start re-assessing our other skilled nursing centers for it. We’re thrilled to have this new technology at SALMON.”
