Medication Room in Boarding School

[rossjj123]

Hi All, 

I work in a very busy Boarding School Health Center. We administer over 15,000 medication a school year and have multiple students on controlled medication. I am trying to arrange our med room to be conducive and safe for administering medication. It is a small space and currently have shelving. I am looking to see if anyone has pictures of their med room. Preferreably ability to have an area for each student since they each have several meds, an area for controlled substance and an area for inhaler/epi pens. Really need to organize the limited space we have. 

[k1p1ssk, BSN, RN]

Hi! I'm curious what grades you serve and how you obtain the controlled substances. It's hard to envision without seeing the volume of meds and the space available, but I am happy to share with you what I'm used to:

 I work part time in a boarding school health center, but we are just 9-12/PG. We are lucky enough to have a medication nurse who is also our assistant director of nursing. Our clinic obtains the RX's from the prescriber and submits them to a local pharmacy which packages them in blister packs, and we keep them locked in a med cart (like you would see on a LTC floor) with a strict medication count done daily, just as you would any kept narcotics/stimulants. The anti-depressants are doled out weekly in a prescription bottle to the student, and they are expected to come pick up the week's worth on Sat/Sun. The epi-pens/inhalers, etc live with the student, and our emergency supply is kept in our assessment/treatment room, along with OTCs that might be administered as a single dose. We also have a double locked med cabinet for other narcotics, as we occasionally have students have orthopedic surgery while school is in session, and they get discharged directly back to campus. We also have a couple kids with things like Fioricet and ativan, so these also get kept and counted in the separate narc box. 

[tining, BSN, RN]

I would prefer to utilize a pre-packaging company.  Meds come in daily pouches and or several times per day pouches on a roll.  At Summer camp we used these and each came in their own box with label of student and a MAR.  We organized by camper group and boys and girls.  Organization would be easy on shelves.  It did cost more for the parent up front, but on your end it as priceless.