11.8 Pharmacy Department Productivity Measurement Processes and Tools

Traditionally, the productivity of the hospital pharmacy department has been measured by the number of medication orders processed, various labor or drug cost ratios, labor hours invested, or a hospital census. Error rate assessments, error-to-medication order ratios, and trend tracking have also been included, and all these productivity measurements have been made easier by the new patient management software systems.

These measurements, however, do not reflect the impact of pharmacy personnel on improving patient outcomes and lowering the cost of patient care. Hospital pharmacy departments are increasingly utilizing other benchmarks contained in EHRs and other pharmacy software to better measure productivity, such as the following:

• the number of medication orders entered, verified, discontinued

• patient profiles reviewed

• progress notes written by clinical pharmacists

• adverse drug reaction reports investigated or even prevented

• participation in CPR codes

• involvement in hospital formulary control committees

• pharmacist dosing of medications (such as certain antibiotics and anticoagulants)

• pharmacist adjustment of medication doses based on patient-specific parameters (such as kidney function)

The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP) has established benchmarks to measure the total department impact on the safe, effective, and efficient use of drugs through the hospital pharmacy services and pharmacist consultations with prescribers and patients. Hospitals can use these benchmarks and their software programs to track these and other productivity and safety impacts to find ways to build efficiencies and identify areas leading to wasted time or medication errors. Technicians are often asked to be part of the data gathering and processing.

The number of staffed pharmacy technicians and the ratio of technicians to pharmacists have a direct impact not only on labor costs, but also on the hospital’s goal to improve patient outcomes and lower hospital costs and potential liability.