Noritsu
Smart Automated Pill Dispensing

The pandemic exacted a huge toll on every industry. However, essential sectors like pharmaceuticals stepped up to fulfill critical requirements, producing and dispensing large amounts of medications to meet rising demands. An important concern affecting pharmacies and care facilities during the pandemic has been staff shortages. Staff shortages have impacted prescription fulfillment at pharmacies as well as prescription administration at care facilities. So, how do pharmacies and care facilities sustain a high level of productivity when manpower is limited?

Given this compelling and continuing challenge, it is clear that automation is the way forward, as evinced by the skyrocketing demand. “Automation technology can help pharmacies better manage labor, output, and consistency, regardless of the situation,” says Mark. D Lawrence, Vice President of Noritsu, and, states Lawrence, “strip pouch packaging in particular can make the administration at the care facility safer and more efficient.”

With a heritage dating back to the 1950s, Noritsu provides cutting-edge pharmacy automation systems that help reduce medication errors, enhance accuracy, and increase throughput in a pharmacy. Noritsu has a legacy as the leader in the photographic imaging industry and, over the years, expanding its business into areas such as technical services, diagnostic imaging, and pharmacy automation.

Automation technology can help to better manage labor, output, and consistency, regardless of the situation

Having expertise in workflow automation, Noritsu offers a broad array of pill packing systems, medicine detection, order archiving, and pharmacy control software options to choose from. These automated systems sort and package medications according to the proper facilities, dosages, and administration, streamlining medication passes for nurses and caregivers while helping minimize medication mistakes. Many patients in long-term care facilities, hospitals and at home require a complex regimen of medications to be administered throughout the day. Traditionally, the medications are packed in vials or blister cards, requiring a caregiver to prepare each dose to ensure that the correct medications are collected and administered properly.

Noritsu’s pill packaging solutions eliminate this necessity by packing each patient’s precise dose into a strip of pouches automatically. Prescription information for a patient is pulled from the pharmacy database. Then, each pouch is printed with vital information which is customized based on facility preferences and state requirements. The strips are then rolled up and organized per facility, ward, and patient, allowing caregivers on-site or even home based patients to conveniently dispense days or weeks’ worth of medications. Noritsu also includes a unique barcode on each pouch that provides the caregiver with the detailed contents of each bag. This barcode can be tied into the eMar software at a care facility providing a very efficient way to ensure the correct medications are being administered. A single barcode reading cross checks the contents of the pouch with the patient’s prescription records. So, both the accuracy and ease of administration are improved.

To better expedite the workflow within the pharmacy while also minimizing medication production delays and errors, Noritsu has introduced NexusRx - Pharmacy Control Software, which is designed to accept prescription information and route it to and through the production line. Lawrence draws attention to the benefits observed by EverSpring LTC Pharmacy, where they were able to reduce 18-hour production day shifts to ten hours with the installation of Noritsu Packagers and implementation of NexusRx Software.

Lawrence explains that Noritsu’s experience with high-tech equipment and industrial workflow across several industries influenced their integration of various technologies to improve what existed in the marketplace. These integrations, with the addition of enhanced software, help pharmacies of all sizes to better utilize labor and space, while ensuring the quality of the end product - safe and easy to administer medications. “Our experience with customer service”, Lawrence continues, “is truly one of our best company traits. We have customers that have been with us for decades because we care about their businesses.”