NIST Approves Positive Identification Standards
The American National Standards Institute adopted the Positive Identification for Patient Safety, Part I, Medication Delivery Standards (pdf). This new set of guidelines is designed to assure that drugs, devices, patients, and other processes involved in the care delivery process are correctly identified. The complete guidelines are available on the HIBCC website.
Partners Healthcare and the Health Industry Business Communications Council (HIBCC) worked collaboratively to create the new standards. The goal was to describe the data formats for various data carriers (which include 2-D symbols, RFID technologies, and bar codes) most commonly employed to correctly identify objects involved in either medication management or administration.
The new standards further describe components involved in the safe delivery of medication and management of such processes. Overall intention of development of these standards was to simplify identification processes.
Incorporated into the process are two-dimensional symbol, bar code, and radio frequency identification technologies. Objects that are considered in the guidelines include patient wristbands, IV medications, device license plate labeling for intelligent devices, smart infusion pumps, employee badges, non-IV medications, and smart infusion pumps.
The statement describing the standards was created to simplify the processes required for identification. This considers the various tools and technologies available in different healthcare facilities and does not solely consider extensive use of technology tools.
Included in the standard are a dictionary of both optional and mandatory data elements for each given area and considerations with respect to area of use. Descriptions for data organization are also described.
April 25, 2008 Related topics: Standards, Partnerships & Consortia, Standardization