Iowa pharmacy tech watered down the good stuff

[47of74]

An Iowa pharmacy tech has been caught in the act of watering down the drugs at Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines...

http://www.kcci.com/article/investigation-731-patients-pain-medications-possibly-replaced-with-saline/7584752

Quote

Over the course of six weeks, 731 people may have been given the watered-down drugs.

Instead of patients receiving a prescribed painkiller called fentanyl, a drug 50 times more potent than heroin, as many as 731 people could have received nothing more than salt water.

Methodist Medical Center officials said the pharmacy tech had legitimate access to portable medication carts that are placed throughout the hospital where the fentanyl was stored.

“What was reported to us is that these were IV medications,” Unity Point Health Vice President Eric Lothe said. “So that the tamper proof packaging had been messed or opened up just slightly, a needle inserted, medication withdrawn and then replaced with sterile water.”

 

[MarblesMom]

Ah, the fentanyl people.  Yee gads, Beaver, this is rough stuff.  I have done a ton of reading on this, and there is an epidemic of people smoking this stuff.  That pharm tech might have been  stealing it to sell.  Just sick.

Fentanyl helped my 93 y/o MIL finally relax enough to pass away.  It was a miracle drug at the time.

So sad that  the people who really needed it, in this case, suffered longer without the original formulation.

These are crazy times, folks.

[polecat]

This is horribly cruel -- I feel for all those people who may have been suffering from possibly unbearable pain and getting no relief. How awful! 

[clueliss]

When I saw the headline of this article, I was reminded of a pharmacist in Kansas City who 'watered down' all sorts of drugs (formulations performed by the pharmacist - not things in pill form).  A lot of the people affected were cancer patients.  There was FBI involvement.

[Dreadcrumbs]

Doing that to folks that really need something as potent as Fentanyl is cruel. 

[CelticGoddess]

When I worked in LTC/Hospice (I had a lot of hospice patients on my unit), there was a nurse who was taking my patients Roxanol and replacing it with water.  She also stole entire cards of MS Contin and Oxycontin.  It took them forever to figure out it was her and meanwhile my hospice patients (most with cancer) were not getting relief.  Some of these patients were getting the Roxanol every hour.  Honestly, if she was going to do this, I wish she had just taken the entire vial.  At least then I could get the pharmacy to bring me another bottle and she would have been caught earlier.

 

Sadly this happens far to often.  usually in places where there are few checks. 

On October 27, 2016 at 0:37 AM, MarblesMom said:

Ah, the fentanyl people.  Yee gads, Beaver, this is rough stuff.  I have done a ton of reading on this, and there is an epidemic of people smoking this stuff.  That pharm tech might have been  stealing it to sell.  Just sick.

Fentanyl helped my 93 y/o MIL finally relax enough to pass away.  It was a miracle drug at the time.

So sad that  the people who really needed it, in this case, suffered longer without the original formulation.

These are crazy times, folks.

 

When a patient is on a fentanyl patch, it's changed every 3 days.  There is still enough fentanyl left in the patch that some people will steep it in boiling water then inject or drink it. And if the patients is on a heavy dose of fentanyl (50 mics or more), there is more.  The nurse in my other post was also stealing the used patches.   As I said, it happens far to often.

[August]

A few years ago a nurse in New Hampshire was stealing patients IV painkillers. He would inject most of it to them, then save himself the last little bit in the syringe. But then he decided that it was a bad idea to use so many used needles, so he switched the order. He would give himself a little, then inject them with the rest. 

 

Only he caught Hep B before he made the switch, then proceed to not only take the person's pain meds, but give them all Hep B.

[MarblesMom]

So sad that the people we trust to take care of us do this.

[LadyCrow1313]

My mother's gone through cancer twice, and as a result she's on a pain medicine for relief (not that it helps her much, really; I suggested Mary Jane as an alternative, but she's apparently allergic to it). If someone pulled this crap with her meds, the pharmacists would find themselves in need of such medication. Just sayin'.

Anyone that does this "watering down" nonsense should get the book thrown at them. Buttholes.