ICU Receives Award for Excellence - UCLA Health System

New Medication System Reduces Errors
More than 2,000 nurses throughout Ronald
Reagan UCLA Medical Center have finished
training on a new bar-coded medication
system designed to improve patient safety
by minimizing medication errors.
Christine Alanes, R.N., scans a medication.
The system uses a computer software program
that assigns matching bar codes to patients’
identity bracelets and their medications. The
program confirms the patient’s name, type of
medication and dosage, as well as the timing
and method of delivery, before giving the nurse
a green light to administer the medication. It
also creates an electronic medication record that
physicians can easily view.
“There is still a lot of nursing judgment and
thought that goes into medication administration,”
says Director of Clinical Systems Ellen Pollack,
UCLA Medical School Legends
On November 15, the David Geffen School of
Medicine officially dedicated its new Founders Room,
located in the main lobby of the Center for Health
Sciences. The occasion brought together three former
deans and the current dean. From left to right, former
Dean Sherman Mellinkoff; current Vice Chancellor for
Health Sciences and Dean A. Eugene Washington;
former Dean Kenneth Shine; and former Vice
Chancellor and Dean Gerald S. Levey.
R.N., who served as project director. “The nurse
has to ask, ‘is this the right drug for this patient
at this time?’ However, the safety benefits of the
system is valued greatly by the nurses.”
Pharmacy, nursing and information technology
departments worked together to create, test and
implement the bar-coded medication system,
Pollack says. “Without the tremendous efforts
of many individuals, this would not have been
possible,” she says.
Key among those organizing the program were
Diane Zalba, director of pharmaceutical services;
Virginia Moore, computer support pharmacist;
Jeff Repinski, of medical information technology
services, who led the IT effort; and Christine
Alanes, Donna Wellbaum and Meg Furukawa,
who served as clinical project managers.
“It ties us all together in a way we never were
before,” Pollack says. “It creates better teamwork
and coordination of care and is more efficient.”
The program was implemented one nursing unit
at a time in two-week intervals for more than a
year. Nurses underwent a three-hour training
course and had two weeks worth of round-theclock
support from “nurse superusers.”
So far, nurses using 475 scanners on 1,000
computers loaded with the software have
scanned more than 1.7 million medication
doses into the system. Nurses at Resnick
Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA and Santa
Monica-UCLA Medical Center and Orthopaedic
Hospital are slated to receive training on the
system in the future.
Hana Malek, B.S.N., C.C.R.N., wearing the
Beacon Award pin.
Beacon Award
Continued from page 1
medical director of neuro-critical care.
“Our nurses personify what an ICU
nurse of the future should be: a highly
skilled, autonomous and critically thinking
professional that delivers the right care at
the right time to intensive care patients.”
The 6 ICU team treats patients who have
suffered brain injuries as a result of
trauma, diseases, disorders or abnormalities
of the brain or spine that require
intensive care or surgical intervention.
“This is a unit where a majority of patients
experienced something sudden and devastating
— a brain bleed, a stroke or a car
accident,” says Neurology ICU Nursing
Director Barbara Anderson, R.N. “It takes
a great deal of skill to handle the multiple
critical issues that occur.”
The unit uses team-building activities to
increase trust and respect among the
120 nurses who work in the Neurology
ICU, Anderson says. Nurses who have
gone out of their way for the team are
recognized by their charge nurses and
peers. Using the UCLA Department
of Nursing’s relationship-based care
model, the unit also has a representative
“practice council” that works on issues
affecting service and quality of care, such
as family visiting policies and meeting
standards of care.
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