Approved Hospital Formulary
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Approved Hospital Formulary
3/7/24 Naloxone prn orders
March 7, 2024
Pharmacists,
As mentioned at Huddle on Wednesday, the number of naloxone prn orders for patients meeting criteria for high-risk is currently trending down. Due to this being a Joint Commission concern, we wanted to bring the following to the attention of all pharmacists:
Pharmacists may automatically add a PRN order for nalOXone to a patient’s medication profile if the patient has opiates ordered via any route or frequency, including PRN.
To improve safety with other opiates:
- Pharmacist can automatically add a PRN order for nalOXone for patients receiving the following:
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- Injectable opiates, PRN, scheduled or continuous
- Oral opiates, PRN, or scheduled
- Opiates through other routes (ex. fentaNYL patch)
- The order would read as follows:
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- nalOXone (Narcan) 0.1 mg IV q1 min x 4 PRN RR<7, apnea, or over-sedation. Max dose of 0.4 mg
- The order would be designated as, "Per P&T Policy," to indicate that the order had been added by the pharmacist.
Please reach out if you have any questions or concerns!
Thank you,
Trish Elder, PharmD
PGY-1 Pharmacy Resident
Huntsville Hospital
101 Sivley Rd., Huntsville, AL 35801
(256) 265-6251