In Cirrus, prescribing antibiotics is similar to prescribing other medications which may lead to wrong compliance as unability to track the whole information related to antibiotics requisitions. Now, in order to comply with regulations that are required for some drug families such as antibiotics or high risk meds, we improved the Automatic Stop Policy* window configuration where ECS staff users can now enter a Catalog of Reasons for Motive field when prescribing products from this class and two new checks that will make Reason and Instructions mandatory :
*Request settings via ticket or chat.
In our example, we edited the Antibiotics product class by adding two new reasons to the catalog : Prophylactic and Empirical. Also, we made both Reason and Instructions mandatory for when prescribing any medication that belongs to the antibiotics product class.
This enhancement will impact as follows in all of these Cirrus screens :
Inpatient Rx process
Orders
With this configuration, in Orders window and other prescription processes (such as CPOE), if you prescribe any antibiotic drug, you will be required to select the Motive and to enter Indications before saving :
This information will also appear on Indications column from the Active Orders option :
And in the printed version of this same report :
Electronic Patient Record
If we go to the Electronic Patient Record of this patient and select their current encounter, we may see data from these two fields in Medications tab, Indications column :
And in the printed version of the EHR report :
Pharmacist Dashboard
Pharmacists can also see this information in Pharmacist Dashboard. If they select this patient that was prescribed an antibiotic drug, they must see this information in Indications tab :
And in Prepare Doses header :
Outpatient Rx process
This rule will also apply for outpatients, where after setting the mandatory fields and catalogs of reasons, clinicians will see that these two fields are mandatory for this type of meds. Here, you must also select the motive from any of the reasons that appear on catalog. Complete these two fields before saving.
If we go to Electronic Patient Record to check the discharge medications, you will see data for these two fields in Indications column :
And in the printed version of the patient's Electronic Health Record :
Pharmacists can also view this information in Outpatient Pharmacy Dashboard, where if you enter this patient's record and select the antibiotic that must be delivered, you will see data from these two fields in the order header :
Notes :
Prescribed drugs must have their product class correctly assigned or else they will not be considered a part of the behavior added in Automatic Stop Policy.
We hope this improves your Cirrus experience. Remember to share this information and ask for help if you need it.
Date: October 9, 2023.