Medication Turnaround Time in the Inpatient Setting

Current Findings in the Literature: A potential benefit of health IT in inpatient settings is decreased medication turnaround time. Many advocate that electronic processes for medication ordering and pharmacy verification and dispensing are more efficient than paper­based systems because they may be: (1) instantly delivered to the pharmacy as opposed to manually written by the physician, delivered to the appropriate department by the clerk, transcribed to the medication administration record (MAR) by the nurse, and processed by the pharmacy; (2) easier to read as compared to copies of providers’ handwriting; (3) more complete because of required fields; and/or (4) more legible to the pharmacist, reducing the need for clarification phone calls to the provider.