APP Pharmaceuticals improves its heparin vial designs to avert errors

It’s not being sued for its confusing heparin packaging as Baxter Healthcare has been. Still APP Pharmaceuticals has taken the initiative to enhance the labeling of its 1 mL and 2 mL heparin sodium injections to avert any potential for drug errors. Among the changes it has made are uprighting the text so that it reads horizontally, using bolder colors for the caps and labels, selecting a larger font size for each strength, affixing bar codes on units of use, etc. The Schaumburg, Ill., company hopes that these measures will help practitioners choose this high-alert drug at the right concentration for the right route. According to Deena Reyes, VP of marketing at APP, the changes are based on feedback from a medication errors group of the Institute for Safe Medications Practices. This photo shows the before and after design of the 1 mL vial.

To see more Daily News articles, click here.

To go to the Drug Topics homepage, .