METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR LABELING A MEDICINAL SUBSTANCE

• US 20130221087A1
• Filed: 02/27/2013
• Published: 08/29/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 02/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Codonics Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Codonics Incorporated
• Inventors: Keefe, Gary, Srnka, Lawrence, Kolberg, Michael, Jablonski, Timothy
• Granted Patent: US 8,893,970 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 235/375
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 20/10 relating to drugs or medications, e.g. for ensuring correct administration to patients
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/63 for local operation

Abstract

Provided is a method for reading a code from a container of a medicinal substance and printing a label for the container. The method includes reading a machine readable code associated with a container for storing a medicinal drug. The machine readable code includes an identification information of the medicinal drug. The method also for determining a useful life of the medicinal drug based on a time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug was initially accessed and encoding a label content including the useful life of the medicinal drug. The method also includes printing a label including the label content including the useful life of the medicinal drug.

Claims

1. An apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance comprising:

a scanner that scans a first machine-readable code associated with a source container storing the medicinal substance to be delivered to a patient;

a processor component comprising;

a substance identification component that determines, based at least in part on said scanning of the first machine-readable code, an identity of the medicinal substance stored in the source container,

a usage component that establishes a time at which the medicinal substance stored in the source container was initially accessed, and

a labeler component that generates label content comprising information indicating a useful life of the medicinal substance stored in the source container in a machine readable format, based at least in part on the time established by the usage component; and

a printer for printing a label comprising the label content to indicate the useful life of the medicinal substance in response to subsequent scanning of the label content.

2. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1,

wherein the usage component establishes the time at which the medicinal substance stored in the source container was initially accessed based on a time of said scanning of the first machine-readable code associated with the source container.

3. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1,

wherein said labeler component generates the label content further comprising the information indicating the identity of the medicinal substance stored in the source container, and

said printer prints the label content to indicate the identity of the medicinal substance stored in the source container.

4. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1,

wherein the first machine-readable code is associated with one or more of:

a primary package associated with the source container storing the medicinal substance, and

a secondary package that comprises a plurality of primary packages.

5. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1, wherein

said scanner is operable to scan the label comprising the label content to obtain information indicating the useful life of the medicinal substance;

and

said processor component further comprises a time until expiration component to determine an amount of time before expiration of the medicinal substance, based on the information indicating a useful life of the medicinal substance and a time of said scanning of the label.

6. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 5, said processor component further comprising:

a useful life warning component to determine if the amount of time before expiration of the medicinal substance is less than a secondary useful life of the medicinal substance in a patient delivery device for delivering the medicinal substance to the patient, then to provide an useful life warning signal; and

a warning device to provide an audio and/or a visual warning signal to a user based on the useful life warning signal.

7. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 6,

wherein the time until expiration component determines the information indicating a useful life of the medicinal substance, based on one or more of:

(a) a time of said scanning of the label, the time that the medicinal substance was initially accessed, the identity of the medicinal substance, and an expiration time after initial access for the medicinal substance,

wherein the label content further comprises;

the time that the medicinal substance was initially accessed and the identity of the medicinal substance;

(b) the time of said scanning of the label, and a time of expiration due to initial usage based on the time at which the medicinal substance stored in the source container was initially accessed,

wherein the label content further comprises;

the time of expiration due to initial usage; and

(c) the time of said scanning of the label, the time that the medicinal substance was initially accessed, and an amount of time until expiration after initial access of the medicinal substance,

wherein the label content further comprises;

the amount of time until expiration after initial access of the medicinal substance and the time that the medicinal substance was initially accessed.

8. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 5,

wherein the label content further comprises the identity of the medicinal substance;

said processor component further comprising;

a patient allergy database comprising allergy information for the patient, and

an allergy warning component that determines if the patient is allergic to the medicinal substance, based on the identity of the medicinal substance and the allergy information for the patient, then to provide an allergy warning signal; and

a warning device to provide an audio and/or visual warning signal to a user based on the allergy warning signal.

9. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 5,

wherein the first machine-readable code is provided by a manufacturer of the medicinal substance,

wherein the label is configured to be affixed to a multi-use vial in locations including one or more of:

the bottom of the multi-use vial,

around a neck of the multi-use vial,

in an open area of the multi-use vial not covered by the first machine-readable code,

partially covering the first machine-readable code, and

fully covering the first machine-readable code,

wherein the label is generated in response to said scanning of the first machine-readable code,

wherein the label is a second machine-readable code comprising, and

wherein the time until expiration component to determine an amount of time before expiration of the medicinal substance is further based on a time of said scanning of the label by the scanner or a time of a subsequent scanning of the label.

10. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1, further comprising:

a user interface for inputting data to the labeler component to be included in the label content,

11. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 10,

said processor component, in response to one or more of said scanning of the first machine-readable code and said scanning of the label content, informs a user via the user interface of the identity of the medicinal substance.

12. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 1,

wherein the label is one or more of:

an optically read machine readable code and a radio frequency code, and

wherein the scanner is configured to scan the label content from the label as one or more of;

an optically read machine readable code and a radio frequency code.

13. The apparatus for labeling a medicinal substance of claim 3,

wherein the identity of the medicinal substance associated with the label is provided by one or more of:

(a) the substance identification component that determines the identity of the medicinal substance stored in the source container,

(b) a user input via a user interface,

(c) the scanner that further scans a second machine-readable code of a second source container that is associated with the label and the source container, wherein the second source container is associated with the medicinal substance stored in the source container, and

(d) the scanner that further scans a third machine-readable code of a secondary package that is associated with the source container.

14. A method of labeling a medicinal drug, comprising:

reading a machine readable code associated with a primary package or a secondary package,

wherein the primary package is associated with a container for storing the medicinal drug,

wherein the secondary package comprises a plurality of primary packages, and

wherein the machine readable code comprises, at least, an identification information of the medicinal drug;

determining a useful life of the medicinal drug based on a time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug was initially accessed;

encoding a label content comprising;

the useful life of the medicinal drug;

printing a label comprising;

the label content comprising;

the useful life of the medicinal drug.

15. The method labeling the medicinal drug of claim 14, further comprising:

reading the label comprising the label content; and

calculating an amount of time until an expiration of the medicinal drug based on the useful life of the medicinal drug.

16. The method of labeling the medicinal drug of claim 15, further comprising:

determining if the amount of time until the expiration is less than the useful life of the medicinal drug in a dispensing device used to dispense the medicinal drug to a patient;

then

in response to said determining, warning a user of an expiration condition via an audio alert and/or a visual alert.

17. The method of labeling the medicinal drug of claim 16,

wherein the useful life of the medicinal drug based on the time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug was initially accessed comprises, at least, one or more of:

(a) the time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug was initially accessed and the identification information of the medicinal drug,

(b) a time of expiration due to initial access to the container for storing the medicinal drug, and

(c) the time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug was initially accessed and an amount of time until the expiration due to initial access to the container for storing the medicinal drug.

18. The method of labeling the medicinal drug of claim 17,

said calculating the amount of time until the expiration of the medicinal drug is further based on an another access time at which the container for storing the medicinal drug is accessed after the medicinal drug was initially accessed.

19. The method of labeling the medicinal drug of claim 14,

said encoding a label content further comprising:

the identification information of the medicinal drug; and

said printing a label comprising;

the label content further comprising;

the identification information of the medicinal drug,

wherein said printing is in response to said reading of the machine readable code.

20. A method of labeling a medication in a hospital, comprising:

reading a machine readable code from a first label associated with a secondary package or at least one of a plurality of primary packages containing the medication;

determining, based at least in part on the machine readable code, an identity of the medication;

determining a useful life of the medication based on a time at which the container for storing the medication was initially accessed;

encoding the identity of the medication and the useful life in a machine-readable form to be included in label content; and

printing a label comprising the label content to indicate the identity and the useful life of the medication.

21. The method of labeling the medication of claim 20, further comprising:

reading the label comprising the label content indicating the useful life of the medication;

calculating an amount of time until an expiration of the medication based on a time of said reading the label and the useful life of the medication;

determining if an amount of time until an expected expiration of the medication in a delivery package is less than a remaining life of the medication labeled with the label; and

in response to determining that the amount of time until the expected expiration is later than the expiration of the medication, issuing a warning to a user via an audio alert and/or a visual alert.