Wireless System Controls Medication Delivery to Patients

A wireless syringe infusion system allows health care providers to send and receive medication delivery to patients in critical care units information more efficiently, helping prevent medication errors.

The Medfusion 4000 syringe infusion pump includes enhanced, user-friendly features based on clinician usability input, including wireless (802.11b/g) and wired Ethernet capability that allows easy connections to PharmGuard server software, a scalable and upgradeable web-based application that enables the wireless collection, management, and continuous quality improvement (CQI) reporting of patient infusion data. The data is used to track trends in compliance with medication dosing and clinical best practices. The PharmGuard server software also sends drug library updates to infusion pumps and tracks pump locations within the facility, assisting technical staff to access the pumps for preventative maintenance, cleaning, and other requirements.


The PharmGuard software suite also includes the Toolbox medication safety software, which allows pharmacists to develop drug libraries according to hospital-defined medication dosing best practices, and then deploy them to Medfusion 4000 pumps. Additional SureLink remote support software runs in the background on a hospital's Microsoft Windows-based workstation or server, and allows customer support specialists to monitor devices and software, diagnose problems, provide software installation and upgrades, and supply remote support. The Medfusion 4000 syringe infusion pump is a product of Smiths Medical (Ashford, United Kingdom).

"The Medfusion pump is a small, lightweight pump that is simple to use; managing the drug library and programming the pump is intuitive,” said Erin O'Shaughnessy, RN, and Mary MacNeil, RN, director of nursing practice and education at Children's Hospital of East Ontario (CHEO, Ottawa, Canada). "With the new wireless system, we will be able to have timely access to drug library updates as well as downloads of infusion practice data without interruptions to patient care.”

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