What should outpatient surgery managers do when it comes to multi-dose vials? Adhere to national recognized guidelines, recommends Jan Allison, RN, CHSP, of Washington, OK, director of accreditation and survey readiness for Surgical Care Affiliates.
“The identified best practices are most commonly resourced from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the United States Pharmacopeia General Chapter 797,” Allison says. The standards are built into government requirements and accreditation standards. “They exist to reduce/prevent the risk of serious disease transmission,” she says. Allison says the standards include:
- Dedicate a multi-dose vial to a single patient whenever possible.
- If using a multi-dose vial for more than one patient, do not store or access in the immediate patient treatment area.
- If storing or accessing a multi-dose vial in the immediate patient treatment area, dedicate the vial to that patient only and discard after use.
- Always access the medication in a multi-dose vial with a new, sterile needle and syringe each time.
- Use aseptic technique when accessing multi-dose vials, and ensure the diaphragm of the vial is cleansed appropriately with alcohol or other approved antiseptic.
- Discard the multi-dose vial whenever sterility is compromised or questionable.
- Date and discard an opened or accessed multi-dose vial within 28 days unless the manufacturer specifies a different date for that opened vial.
- Discard an unopened or non-accessed multi-dose vial according to the manufacturer’s expiration date.
