JCAHO Requirement

[FineAgain]

The Joint Commission is visiting us this week. Seems they are telling us we now have to provide a pill splitter for every patient. I guess I understand the reasoning behind it but this seems a little excessive. Why not put the effort into education about cleaning it between uses. How does your facility handle this?

[slinster]

We also have one pill cutter per inpatient, that they can then take home. This became a concern because of the mixing of meds that other pts. may be allergic too (and the cutter NOT being cleaned between pts), and because cleaning the pill cutters between patients became a caregiver safety issue when they have cut themselves on the "cutter" while wiping with an alcohol pad.

[Nunya, BSN]

Uh oh! I've been using my Mom's pill splitter for my cat's methimazole, Mom takes levothyroxine! ?

[Asystole RN]

On 11/6/2013 at 6:47 PM, FineAgain said:

The Joint Commission is visiting us this week. Seems they are telling us we now have to provide a pill splitter for every patient. I guess I understand the reasoning behind it but this seems a little excessive. Why not put the effort into education about cleaning it between uses. How does your facility handle this?

Pill splitters are like a $1.50, why invest hundreds of hours thousands of dollars in payroll and training costs for something that would require competency and validation when you can spend a few hundred dollars and supply everyone with a pill splitter?