Pharmacy Tech: Cart Fill

• Twenty-four-hour cart fill is an important function of a pharmacy technician in institutional pharmacy practice.
• Cart fill is also known as medication pick and medication fill, which are forms of drug distribution that differ among institutions.
• The cart fill method involves quickly and accurately filling the required unit-dosed medications for patients to cover their doses for a specific time.
• A unit dose is medication packaged in a single-dose, one-time-use container or package.
• Terminology and procedures vary slightly when filling a supply of medications for hospital patients.
• Supply can range between 12, 24, 48, 72 hours, or even 1 week.
• Patient cart fill medications can be placed in drawers, trays, bins, carts, cassettes, or resealable zipper bags.
• Some facilities are phasing out cart fill methods and instead using cart fill medication reports to load doses into automated medication dispensing systems, while larger facilities use automated robots.
• Always check the expiration date of every dose put into a drawer.
• Expiration dates vary, but medications must have at least one month of "good" dating left.
• Unacceptable doses may not be used in the cart fill.
• Standard procedure requires filling the cart by referring to a Cart Fill Form or pick list, typically generated every 24 hours.
• The form presents categories of information.

Medication Orders

• Medication orders are written or verbal directions from a prescribing practitioner for a medication to be administered to a patient.
• Medication orders consist of a start date and time and a medication name, strength, and dosage form.

Drug Names

• Hospitals have different medication arrangements, but all must comply with The Joint Commission standards.
• Some hospitals organize into categories (hazardous, inhalations, injectable, optic, otic, topical, nonformulary) and then arrange by generic name.
• Some medications are arranged by brand name and include combination drugs with multiple active ingredients.
• Naming conventions also vary among states and facilities.

Strength

• Strength refers to the amount of drug given in a dosage form such as in an individual tablet, capsule, ampule, or vial.

Directions

• Directions are the physician's directions for administration of the medication, including the route and the signa.

Number to Dispense

• Number to dispense indicates the quantity of medication that should be placed in the patient's drawer and is calculated based on the number of hours in the institution's fill period and the signa.
• The length of the fill period varies among institutions, twenty-four hour fills.

Class or Primary Use

• The Cart Fill Form for this lab includes an extra column, Class or Primary Use, which has been added to help you learn the drug classifications and primary uses of many common medications.