SmUDo (Smart Unit-Dose): Redefining efficiency, quality, and staffing strategies for optimized processes

Area of Science:

• Pharmacy practice
• Health informatics
• Healthcare management

Background:

• Unit-dose dispensing systems (UDDS) are crucial for digital transformation in hospital pharmacies, enhancing medication management, efficiency, and patient safety.
• Lack of standardized metrics for workforce planning and cost assessment hinders UDDS adoption and resource optimization.

Purpose of the Study:

• Establish benchmarks for staffing requirements and costs associated with UDDS implementation and operation.
• Provide data-driven guidance for optimizing resource allocation and workforce management in hospital pharmacy settings.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of data from a 1,800-bed tertiary care hospital with 1,680 UDDS beds (2021-2024).
• Evaluation of key performance metrics including task-specific work times, machine utilization, and productivity (blistered tablet output, blister bag production per FTE).

Main Results:

• A staffing benchmark of 0.45 FTE per 100 UDDS beds was identified.
• Significant improvements in workforce efficiency were observed, with FTE per 1 million blistered tablets decreasing from 3.2 to 1.7.
• Cost per blister bag decreased from €0.55 to €0.22, production tripled, and a gold standard of 1 FTE per 10,000 cases was established.

Conclusions:

• The study provides practical benchmarks for enhancing UDDS productivity, resource allocation, and workforce management.
• These benchmarks offer a framework for continuous improvement in hospital pharmacy operations and support evidence-based decision-making.
• Established UDDS benchmarks promote cost-efficient operations and serve as indicators of patient safety and clinical quality.