Background: The drug inventory in the hospital consumes a large part of the hospital's budget. Classic drug management is based on weekly visits of the pharmacist in the departments, writing an order and dispensing it. This method is wasteful in terms of sending a bulk of drugs that will not necessarily be utilized, and it is also inefficient in terms of human resources. The unit-dose method, which is more advanced, is based on filling out individual prescriptions for each of the inpatients in the department. This minimizes the potential of making an error on administration of the drug to the patient, while reducing the shelf-inventory in the department. A new method has been initiated at Barzilai Medical Center, starting January 2013, based on the implantation of the NAMER computerized clinical record system. This method, called SHERLOCK, which transforms the physician orders into logistic information for the pharmacist, holds all the unit-dose method advantages without the heavy costs. The system is an innovative development of the pharmacy staff in cooperation with the computer department.
Objectives: To design a computerized system to make drug inventory management more efficient. Methods: We started using the SHERLOCK system in the two computerized internal departments.
Results: The data for 9 months was collected during January- September 2013 and was compared to data for the same period in 2012. This showed a significant reduction in the cost of drug distribution (p<0.05). This reduction projects an almost 20% decrease in the yearly budget at the research department. In the control departments, no significant reduction has been demonstrated.
Conclusions: In light of these results, it is visible that the SHERLOCK system is an efficient tool to improve drug inventory management and medication safety.