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Connecticut hospital streamlines operations with investments in labeling and packaging automation from Euclid


Connecticut hospital streamlines operations with investments in labeling and packaging automation from Euclid  

Introduction

In an era full of new technology, there are ample opportunities for hospital pharmacies to leverage automation that can offer extensive benefits. In 2020, America’s hospitals have had to adjust their daily operations to address safety precautions, medication shortages, and more – leaving many on the hunt for new approaches to increase efficiency and safety. For hospital pharmacies, automation technology can have a major impact on efficiencies and lowering operating costs. 


The Hospital of Central Connecticut, located in New Britain, Connecticut, was created with the 2006 merger of former hospitals New Britain General and Bradley Memorial. Affiliated with the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, the hospital serves a wide variety of patients through their comprehensive inpatient and outpatient services in general medicine and surgery and a wide variety of specialties.


With the rise of COVID-19, The Hospital of Central Connecticut was looking for solutions to their concerns involving medication shortages and back orders, boosting efficiency and updating outdated machinery.


VANTAGE LABEL PRINTER

The Problem

The Hospital of Central Connecticut was utilizing outdated label printing machinery that wasn’t fulfilling their customized needs. 


“Our current medication label printer was not user friendly and difficult to switch between labels, '' said Alex Tentoni, pharmacy technician coordinator at The Hospital of Central Connecticut. “With each switch of medication, we would end up wasting nearly 10 labels due to alignment issues.” 


In order to label patient medication properly and efficiently, they needed a software-compatible, user friendly bar code label printer that was easy to customize for each medication and machinery that was affordable.


The Solution

After doing some initial research and connecting with Euclid® Medical Products’ customer service team,  The Hospital of Central Connecticutquickly realized the Vantage Label Printer by Euclid® Medical Products fit all of their criteria and had the upgrades they needed for success.


“Our current bar code label printer was costing our pharmacists time and our hospital money,” said Tentoni. “We needed a label printer that was straightforward and adaptable to keep operations running efficiently.”


The Vantage™ Label Printer is a high-quality thermal printer to print labels that pharmacies need and it combines speed and efficiency without compromising print quality. The Label Printer provides reliable, simplified solutions for any hospital with Vantage™ software seamlessly integrated into the device, the Vantage™ Label Printer eliminates the need for a second database of drug information and has the ability to read 2D barcodes at speeds of up to 4 inches per second and contains 600 DPI printing capabilities. 


The Results

Automated labeling streamlines the process, keeps hospital pharmacies organized and frees up staff. “The Vantage™ Label Printer has helped tremendously with our COVID clinics, allowing us to print custom labels to keep track of inventory and for vaccination cards,” said Tentoni. “Having all labels operating in a standard format has helped the pharmacists streamline their workflow without switching computer programs, or taking time to fix label formatting problems.”


Investing in automated machinery that both is convenient for pharmacists and boosts patients safety is key to running a well oiled hospital. Euclid’s® Vantage Label Printer eliminates daily or weekly labeling complications for a simplified packaging process while also improving patient safety.


CADET TWIN 2X2

The Problem

In addition to labeling medication, COVID-19 brought forth further challenges in regards to high patient volume in The Hospital of Central Connecticut’s COVID-19 clinic, as well as medication shortages across the country.


“With limited access to certain medication due to backorders and shortages, we knew we needed to take matters into our own hands,” said Tentoni. “We needed to find a table top unit dose packager that would allow us to quickly and effectively package unit-dose medication from bulk orders to ensure we could maintain quality service for our patients at a time when they needed it the most.”


The hospital was ready to update outdated packaging systems to improve the efficiency of daily tasks - upgrades they weren’t seeing from their current machinery. Aware of the consequences of failing to meet the needs of patients and the potential for increased efficiency, The Hospital of Central Connecticut knew they needed to invest in a unit-dose packaging machine and a partner with a leading company that manufactured these machines.


The Solution

After doing extensive research on tabletop packaging machines and connecting with Euclid Medical Products, The Hospital of Central Connecticut made the decision to invest in the Cadet Twin® 2x2 by Euclid Medical Products to combat their challenges.


The Cadet Twin® 2x2, a unit-dose tabletop packaging machine designed specifically for hospitals with more than 200 beds. For hospitals like The Hospital of Central Connecticut who are currently relying on manual unit dose packaging, most can show an ROI in less than one year if they switch to a table-top packaging machine given the savings on packaging materials and labor.  There is also a significant savings on some pre-unit dosed medications that you can purchase in bulk and do your own unit dose packaging if you have a table top packaging machine.


The Results

Since making the investment, the automated unit-dose packaging machine has streamlined the process and allowed The Hospital of Central Connecticut to fill the gaps brought forth by the pandemic. “The purchase of the Cadet® Twin 2x2 by Euclid Medical Products has supplemented us the most with repackaging medications that are no longer available in unit dose due to COVID-19,” said Tentoni. “Having a packager that quickly and effectively packages unit-doses from bulk has been a life saver! Euclid® was able to deliver a new product and software that was lightyears more advanced than our previous machine.”


The Cadet Twin® 2x2 has helped The Hospital of Central Connecticut increase operational efficiency while also increasing patient safety. “Having the ability to save templates and information from the drug database has been extremely valuable for patient safety,” said Tentoni. “By reducing the manual process of entering drug information for each label the Cadet machine has reduced the risks associated with faulty labeling due to human error.”

 

Tentoni continued, “The Cadet® machine is easy to use and operate which has made it very efficient. Not having to constantly repair or realign the machine is such a time saver and the ability to run reports has also been very valuable for audits and data tracking.”


When asked how it has been working with Euclid® Medical Products, Tentoni said, “The support has been amazing during the entire process. Our rep is just a phone call or text away and always has the answers that we need.” 


Interested in seeing what we can do for you? Call us at 800.727.2543 or email us at info@euclidmedicalproducts.com to learn more about our automated medical packaging equipment and services.



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Automation & Robotics Unit-Dose & Multi-Dose Packaging & Supplies