The future of automation in the health care industry is gaining momentum in the market and familiarity in many hospital pharmacies around North America. In a previous Examiner related article, the role of robotic based automation in the healthcare industry was thoroughly reviewed.

  The whole manual process of counting pills, preparing intravenous (IV) doses of antibiotics and chemotherapeutic drugs, sterilizing bottles and vials, labeling and neatly tucking and packaging your prescription drugs can all be done by different robotic systems/ platforms. All automated robotic platforms share the same end-goals of reducing medication errors, dosage errors, lawsuits and financial liability due to harm and damage derived from mislabeling I.V. and oral compounds, reducing unnecessary biological waste and avoiding cross-contamination generated by a reckless pharmacy technician during the preparation of the compounds.

  Currently, there are three Canadian and US-based companies that manufacture and sell automated filling systems which include: Intelligent Hospital Systems which sells R.I.V.A., Health Robotics which currently markets the CytoCare and IV Station platforms, and the Baxa Corporation IntelliFill® i.v (acquired from ForHealth Technologies, Inc.).

  However, all three systems differ in their speed of processing and preparing I.V. compounds, the computer workflow software, service, marketability and track record of customer service and efficiency .A comparative analysis of all three robotic automated IV compound mixers show that IntelliFill i.v. shows a more compelling and proven track record compared to its latter counterparts for the following reasons:

1. Although the R.I.V.A uses a combination of different robotic modules to weight the substance, sterilize, prepare and stamp the I.V. dose, IntelliFill i.v. is much faster in preparing cytotoxic, and I.V. admixtures in bulk, personal and batch modes. Indeed, the R.I.V.A. system is slower than an experienced technician while IntelliFill i.v. can process up to 300 I.V. compounds per hour. By comparison, R.I.V.A. can only process up to 800 patient specific doses in an eight hour shift (less than 100 doses per hour). That is about three times slower than IntelliFill i.v..

  The lower performance by R.I.V.A. is due to the fact that it uses a robotic arm to carefully and accurately prepare compounds while the IntelliFill i.v. platform is analogous of a manufacturing assembly line: the robot can process batches of doses by carrying out multiple steps simultaneously using multiple automated dispensers, label stampers and a rotating turn-table that holds dozens of vials which facilitates the continuous flow of dose processing.

2. The Baxa IntelliFill i.v. has a superior track record than R.I.V.A. Intelligent Hospital Systems has sold their products to three hospitals in the U.S. thus far. On the other hand, IntelliFill i.v. is currently serving over 30 hospitals in North America. Moreover, IntelliFill i.v.has prepared over more than 30 million doses to date while R.I.V.A. does not even come close to matching that statistic. This is due to the fact that IntelliFill i.v. can prepare admixture compounds in batch mode or bulk mode while the R.I.V.A. system prepares doses in a more patient specific manner (one dose at a time).

3 R.I.V.A. ensures that the correct oral or I.V. drug being prepared by keeping a record of different biometric values such as weight, volume, and internal vial pressure and taking a final picture of the prepared product. In addition to doing all the forementioned steps, IntelliFill i.v. improves admixture safety by introducing mulitple safety steps to ensure the correct drug is being prepared for the correct patient.. This includes a vision system that captures images of the source vial for each syringe for manual review and verification and weight confirmation for each dose; thus ensuring peace of mind and allowing a system for tracking errors. An automated dosage preparation trail for each dose dramatically reduces the time and labor required to check doses for accuracy.

  As put in the words of Marian Robinson, Vice President of Marketing for Baxa, " DoseEdge does not compete with RIVA. What makes IntelliFill I.V. compelling is that it was the first to market automated solution for IV dose filling. It is the only system with a proven track record – with more
than 30 customers in the US and nearly 30 million prepared doses to date. In
addition, the IntelliFill i.v. features high-speed dose automation – preparing 300
doses per hour in reservoir mode."

  Founded in 1975, Baxa corporation is a multinational company with subsidiaries and sales offices in the U.K., Canada , Denmark and Germany and several distribution partners. Baxa is dedicated to preparing, handling, packaging, and administering liquid medications safely and efficiently. Baxa manufactures and markets a wide range of healthcare products for the healthcare industry.
 

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