"The Benefits of Prefilled Syringes"

Switching from vials to prefilled syringes can cut costs and improve patient safety, as recent studies and hospital practice have shown. At the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, anesthesiologists have switched to prefilled syringes for some of their operating room (OR) medications with the intention of reducing the risk for errors and lowering drug expenditures. “The patient safety issue really stems from the fact that anesthesiology is probably the only medical specialty where the same individual writes the prescription, procures the drug, draws it up and administers it, all without a series of checks along the way,” explained Ethan Bryson, MD, an associate professor of anesthesiology and psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. “Having the medication predrawn in a prelabeled syringe goes a long way to reducing the chance that someone will make a mistake.” Learn more.