Hello Nurses-
After several years as a home health nurse, I've just returned to hospital nursing. The manager on my med-surg-tele unit regularly asks nurses to sign dilaudid out of the Accudose for him to administer to patients on the floor. As a brand new employee still on orientation I was afraid to argue with him about whether this practice is right/legal. He contends that it is absolutely okay to have nurses sign out meds to give to him (the manager) to administer and that he "is required to give a certain number of meds each month." I asked him why he doesn't have his own access to the Accudose and he said that it's because he's responsible for reconciling the medications so it would be a conflict for him to have access. I haven't been able to find ANY literature on the internet about policies regarding signing out medications for other nurses and I want to be able to back-up my contention that this can't be okay. Any advice or references to legal or professional sources would be greatly appreciated.