NEW JERSEY SOCIETY OF HEALTH-SYSTEM PHARMACISTS

2012

ANNUAL MEETING/EXHIBITION & INSTALLATION DINNER

FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 2012

HILTON EAST BRUNSWICK 3 TOWER CENTER BLVD. EAST BRUNSWICK, NEW JERSEY (732) 828-2000

PLEASE MARK YOUR CALENDAR!

National Hospital and Health-System Pharmacy Week is October 16-22, 2011. This week acknowledges the invaluable contributions that pharmacists and technicians make to patient care in our nation’s health care institutions. It is an ideal time for pharmacy departments to acknowledge and celebrate their achievements in ensuring safe and effective medication use in their institutions and to share those accomplishments with patients, other health professionals, and the community.

The pharmacist's role has evolved dramatically in recent years, as pharmacists have moved beyond compounding and dispensing medications to become vital members of multidisciplinary patient-care teams. They advise doctors and nurses on the best medications and help monitor every patient’s medication therapy by providing quality checks to detect and prevent harmful drug interactions, reactions, or mistakes. Hospital and health-system pharmacists have been able to take on these enhanced patient-care roles because of a number of factors, including the deployment of highly trained, certified technicians and new technologies like robotics that dispense medications. As the role of pharmacy technicians and the use of technology continue to evolve, patients will have greater opportunities to have a pharmacist involved in their care.

Throughout its history, National Hospital and Health-System Pharmacy Week has served to educate the public and other health care practitioners about the vital work of hospital and health-system pharmacists and technicians. Pharmacists are the leading health care authorities on medications. National Hospital and Health-System Pharmacy Week provides a forum for pharmacists and technicians to showcase their expertise in the health care system and to take pride in their profession.

Click here to view the proclamation.

September 19-23 was “Policy Week” where members of the various policy-recommending councils and the Commission of Affiliate Relations developed proposals for the House of Delegates to review at the Summer Meeting in June. This included a couple of days deliberating the most pressing issues followed by a day spent meeting with Congressional representatives and their staff. These policies are a key part of ASHP’s advocacy efforts and form the basis of the outreach to decision makers like Congress, quality organizations, and other stakeholders.

The issues discussed by the Councils this year included:
•Drug shortages
•Health care reform and practice models
•Globalization of clinical trials
•Pharmacists’ roles in accountable care organizations
•Evaluating competencies of experienced pharmacists
•State regulations of biosimilars interchangeability

web link

North Chapter

October 26, 2011
Topic: Methadone use in Pain Management
Location: St. Joseph’s Wayne Hospital, Meyer Conference Room
224 Hamburg Turnpike
Wayne, NJ
Time: 6:00pm – 7:30pm
Speaker: David Bandola, MD

November 18, 2011
Topic: Medication Safety Symposium
Location: St. Joseph’s Wayne Hospital, Meyer Conference Room
224 Hamburg Turnpike
Wayne, NJ
Time: TBA
Speakers: Several Presenters on the Program

North Centeral

October 19, 2011
Topic: Pediatric Population: Preventing Medication Errors
Location: Overlook Hospital
99 Beauvior Avenue
Summit, NJ
Time: TBA
Speaker: Seema Patel, PharmD
Clinical Pharmacist
Children’s Specialized Hospital
New Brunswick, NJ

Central Chapter

October 27, 2011
Topic: Endothelial Dysfunction
Location: Saint Peter’s University Hospital
254 Easton Avenue
New Brunswick, NJ
Time: TBA
Speaker: George Shehata, BS, PharmD, CACP
Assistant Director/Clinical Coordinator
Residency Program Director
Clara Maass Medical Center
Belleville, NJ

November 29, 2011
Topic: Anticoagulation Update
Location: Somerset Medical Center
110 Rehill Avenue
Somerville, NJ
Time: TBA
Speaker: Luigi Brunetti, PharmD, CGP
Clinical Assistant Professor
Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy
The State University of New Jersey
Piscataway, NJ

Southern Chapter

October 27, 2011
Topic: Principles of Sedation in the ICU
Location: Virtua Center for Learning
1200 Howard Blvd. Suite 100
Mount Laurel, NJ
Time: 5:30pm – 7:45pm
Speaker: Quinn Czosnowski, PharmD, BCPS
Assistant Professor of Clinical Pharmacy
Philadelphia College of Pharmacy
University of the Sciences
Philadelphia, PA

November 30, 2011
Topic: Hospital Based Immunizations
Location: Kennedy Corporate Center
1099 White Horse Road
Voorhees, NJ 08043
Time: 5:30pm – 8:00pm
Speaker: Helen LoSasso, PharmD, BCPS
Clinical Manager Pharmacy Services
Kennedy Health System
Stratford, NJ
Satish V. Poondi, RPh, Esq.
Associate, Wilentz, Goldman & Spitzer PA
Woodbridge, NJ

Upcoming Events
Advocacy and Policy Event, October 11th
Russ Lazzaro will be coming in to speak about several topics regarding pharmacy advocacy and policy, including medical marijuana. Students will get a chance to hear about these important issues, as well as work on a group activity that they will present at the event.
Rutgers Homecoming Run for Rutgers Against Hunger, October 16th
We will be participating in this run/walk on the Rutgers campus to support Rutgers Against Hunger (RAH). We will also be attending the health fair that is to follow.
Monster Mash, October 28th
Children from neighborhoods around the area come to this event as a safe alternative to trick-or-treating. Student organizations set up activities and give out candy. We will be having an arts and crafts activity for the children.
Recent Events
E-board Meeting, September 6th
Officers met to continue planning for the fall 2011 semester. We also worked on posters that we will be presenting at the Phi Lambda Sigma advocacy month kickoff event on September 30th.
Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy Involvement Fair, September 13th
NJSHP had representatives at the student involvement fair to share information about the organization and ways to get involved. There was a lot of student interest in the organization and the upcoming events for this semester.
First General Meeting, September 14th
NJSHP had their first general meeting for the students. There was a brief presentation about the organization and we discussed events that will be held this fall. We also had students sign up for committees, such as fundraising and community outreach.
Clinical Skills Competition, September 28th
Students in teams of two were given a patient case that reflects an actual scenario that pharmacists may encounter. Students had two hours to identify acute and chronic medical problems and develop a pharmacist’s care plan. The top three teams gave a ten minute oral presentation justifying their therapy recommendations. The winners of this event were given a free registration to the Midyear Clinical Meeting where they will compete.

Visit our website www.njshprutgers.weebly.com for information and pictures of our past events.

Please feel free to contact me via e-mail, jkostialik@gmail.com or cell: 973-454-3964 with any questions or comments. – Jennifer Kostialik, NJSHP Rutgers Chapter President

Going Green has too many advantages we just couldn't resist!

•You will receive information more timely without the hassles of snail mail.
•Look for our meeting notices and newsletters to arrive in your e-mail so you can print or view.
•With our savings, we'll have more funds to enhance our member programs.
•Plus, going electronic is a great boost for the environment!

9/9/2011 ASHP participated in an informal roundtable meeting today with Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Margaret Hamburg, Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and other top HHS officials to talk about the impact of drug shortages on the U.S. health care system.

Kasey K. Thompson, Pharm.D., vice president of ASHP’s office of policy, planning, and communications, stressed the need for the FDA to allocate more resources to address drug shortages and urged the FDA to require pharmaceutical manufacturers to notify the agency of product discontinuation or disruption so that the agency can work with them to resolve problems more quickly or to find other companies who may be willing to produce a product that is being discontinued.

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[Corrected Sept. 12, 2011] Kate Traynor BETHESDA, MD 01 September 2011—FDA today announced changes to the labeling (PDF) for zoledronic acid to emphasize new information about the risk for serious or fatal kidney injury after treatment with the drug.

The labeling changes apply to the version of the drug sold as Reclast, which is indicated for the treatment or prevention of osteoporosis and for the treatment of Paget's disease. The labeling for Zometa, a zoledronic acid product indicated for use in patients with cancer, already addresses kidney-injury risks.

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Cheryl A. Thompson BETHESDA, MD 01 September 2011—Anaphylaxis, angioedema, hypotension, and other serious allergic reactions have been reported in patients using the psychotropic agent asenapine, FDA announced today.

The agency, in a Drug Safety Communication, said health care professionals should tell patients using asenapine how to recognize the signs and symptoms of a serious allergic reaction. Those patients should also be told to contact a health care professional immediately if any of the symptoms occur during asenapine therapy.

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8/29/2011 ASHP staff members Joseph Hill and Cynthia Reilly’s article, "Can the United States Ensure an Adequate Supply of Critical Medications?" was published this week in the Food and Drug Policy Forum. The article describes the drug shortages issue, including causes and potential solutions from both a legislative and regulatory perspective.

The Forum is published by the Food and Drug Law Institute (FDLI) which explores issues related to food and drug law and is read and respected by health policy makers, think tank scholars, and others focused on health policy.

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Severe drug shortages are forcing pharmacists and hospitals to buy drugs from the "gray market" at exorbitant prices. The practice, while legal, can result in drug prices inflated by several thousand percent. Secondary wholesalers buying bulk drugs from major wholesalers dry up the supply normally available to hospitals and pharmacies. While artificially creating short supplies is against the law, individual gray market vendors are not large enough to create a shortage by themselves. On the gray market, drugs are traded back and forth between distributors, with price markups along the way, making them impossible to trace for origin or authenticity. During acute shortages of life-saving drugs, gray market distributors could call pharmacists and hospitals offering the medications at vastly inflated prices. The drugs may have also been mishandled, counterfeited, or tainted. The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists urge their members to demand an authentic pedigree from distributors and proof that the vendor is state authorized, but even those requirements do not ensure the safety of the drugs. The Institute for Safe Medication Practices is calling for the federal government to tightly regulate the gray market.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) has called for a Food and Drug Administration hearing and a Government Accountability Office report to address drug shortages in the United States. He made the comments during a call to discuss the findings of a report by quality-improvement and group-purchasing organization Premier on drug shortages and the “gray market.” The report analyzed 1,745 unsolicited gray market sales offers made to its member hospitals during April and May. Of the 636 offers that included price and drug identification information, 96 percent offered drugs with prices that had been doubled. “It's a constant fight for the hospitals, pharmacists and providers, as well as the patients,” said Blumenthal. “We need to take more vigorous action at the federal level so as to ensure patient safety as well as lower costs in healthcare delivery." Lawmakers have introduced legislation this year to address drug shortages, including a bill announced in June by Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) that would require the FDA to notify providers about drug shortages. The FDA has scheduled a hearing on the matter for Sept. 26.

The Medco School of Pharmacy at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, N.J. has announced that it will begin offering programs in specialty pharmacy areas, including clinical trials management, regulatory affairs, medical chemistry, medication therapy management, and health informatics. The school is currently seeking accreditation and is scheduled to open in the fall of 2012. Students will be able to obtain a PharmD degree alone or in combination with a master's degree in pharmaceutical science, business administration, or public administration.

The University of North Texas (UNT) has announced that it will "fast track" the launch of a new pharmacy college with a doctor of pharmacy program. The College of Pharmacy would initially be able to accommodate a class of 80 students, and would grow to 100 students per class by its third year. The program will be housed at the University North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth, but will partner with UNT campuses in Denton and Dallas. UNT officials say that the four-year program will emphasize hands-on training in hospitals and pharmacies across the region. The Texas state legislature authorized UNT to spend $300,000 to establish the college and its curriculum, which is currently in development. Glenn Dillon, vice president for research at the health science center, has been named the pharmacy school's interim dean until a permanent candidate can be found. The program, which has been designed to complement UNT's existing pre-pharmacy program in Denton, Texas, will be the seventh in the state. Texas has six pharmacy schools: the University of Texas at Austin, University of Houston, Texas Southern University, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at Amarillo, Texas A&M University Health Science Center at Kingsville and the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio.

The FDA has approved brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris) to treat Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) and systemic anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL). The effectiveness of the drug in patients with HL was evaluated in a single clinical trial involving 102 patients, while effectiveness in patients with systemic ALCL was evaluated in a clinical trial involving 58 patients. The most common adverse events observed included neutropenia, peripheral sensory neuropathy, fatigue, nausea, anemia, upper respiratory infection, diarrhea, fever, cough, vomiting, and thrombocytopenia. It has also been contraindicated in pregnant women due to potential risk of harm to the fetus.

The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) is cautioning pharmacists, physicians, and nurses against erroneous administration of insulin through inappropriate dosing and treatment of hyperkalemia. The ISMP has received reports of several instances of misadministration by nurses and one instance of misadministration by a pharmacist. "Most of the human errors were associated with knowledge deficits regarding insulin concentration (specifically that 'U-100' means the concentration is 100 units per mL), the differences between insulin syringes and other parenteral syringes, and a perceived urgency with treating hyperkalemia," explained ISMP President Michael Cohen. On insulin syringes, large hashmarks denote increments of 10 mL. When inexperienced pharmacists and nurses examine a syringe, they may think that the large hashmarks signify increments of 1 mL, Cohen said. A pharmacist meaning to prepare a 4 mL dose of insulin may in fact be readying a 40 mL dose. To prevent insulin errors, insulin doses should be readied only by insulin syringe, and only pharmacists who are experienced with using insulin syringes should prepare insulin doses. "Sometimes, the pharmacists aren't as familiar with the insulin syringes as they should be," Cohen said.

The FDA has updated the drug label for zoledronic acid (Reclast) to include new information regarding the risk of kidney failure. Cases of acute renal failure requiring dialysis or having a fatal outcome following the use of this medication have been reported to FDA. Based on these reports, the revised label states that zoledronic acid is contraindicated in patients with creatinine clearance less than 35 mL/min or in patients with evidence of acute renal impairment. The label also recommends that healthcare professionals screen patients prior to administering the drug in order to identify at-risk patients. In addition, the agency has required an update to the Medication Guide for zoledronic acid to contain information about the risk of severe kidney problems.

A new state law in New Hampshire allows pharmacists to administer vaccinations for a bacterial form of pneumonia and for shingles. The move will increase access to vaccinations for the public, says state Rep. Frank Case, a pharmacist. The trend to allow pharmacists to give vaccines has risen from 22 states in 1999 to all 50 in 2009, starting with flu shots and expanding to almost all other vaccines, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Sen. Kemp Hannon, chairman of the New York Senate's Health Committee, has filed a bill that would move products containing hydrocodone from Schedule III of the state's Controlled Substances Act to the more restrictive Schedule II. The move came before a Long Island man was expected to plead guilty to charges that he gunned down four people at a pharmacy in order to steal thousands of hydrocodone pills. The bill increases the punishments for possessing hydrocodone without a prescription. It also means patients could no longer get refills and would have to visit their physician for a new prescription every time they needed more pills.

A recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, published in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, shows that 63.5 percent of 1,931 healthcare workers surveyed were vaccinated during the 2010-2011 flu season, up from 61.9 percent the prior season. Flu vaccination was more common among physicians and nurse practitioners, and the vaccination rate in facilities with mandatory flu vaccination programs was 98.1 percent. Free, on-site vaccinations offered over an extended period made other healthcare workers more likely to be immunized. The findings are a concern for the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of American (SHEA), which states that healthcare workers are professionally and ethically responsible for being vaccinated and it re-released a 2010 position paper supporting mandatory flu vaccination for healthcare workers in response. "The data from the CDC's study demonstrated the effectiveness of policies that make vaccination a requirement for employment," says SHEA President Dr. Steven Gordon. The organization also supports additional methods to prevent the spread of the flu virus to patients and others, such as the isolation of infected patients, hand hygiene and cough etiquette, the use of protective equipment, and restrictions on sick workers and visitors.

Researchers cultured material taken from different sites of white coats or uniforms worn by clinicians, and found that of 238 samples collected, exactly half were positive for some pathogen. Physicians' garb contained the same number of pathogens as did nurses' attire. Many of the samples revealed the presence of multi-drug resistant organisms, including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The researchers stressed that their research did not examine whether healthcare workers' contaminated clothing increased germ transmission to patients. However, they made several recommendations based on the data. "Wearing a clean uniform daily, providing adequate laundering, improving hand hygiene practices, and using plastic aprons when performing tasks that may involve splashing or contact with body fluids likely will decrease the bacterial load on uniforms," they wrote. The study was published in the September issue of the American Journal of Infection Control.