Infusion Technology Purchasing: It’s Not Just about Pumps

​As with many devices, purchasing infusion pumps is much more complicated than it used to be. Infusion system purchases today involve buying a complete drug delivery platform, including pumps, software, and communication interfaces. In addition, if you plan to utilize wireless networking capabilities on your infusion pumps, you must ensure that the hospital network is equipped to provide reliable wireless communication everywhere a pump will be. Finally, to experience the safety benefits of dose error reduction systems (DERS), a large commitment to drug standardization and drug library development is required.

Buying a pump involves establishing a long-term relationship with the pump's supplier, on whom you'll have to rely heavily for initial implementation, product upgrades, and ongoing support. The barrier to switching suppliers once you've already implemented a smart pump model is also much higher than with traditional pumps: If you're going to switch, you will probably have to make changes to the drug library, which can be time-consuming. You'll also need to consider that the differences in operation between the devices means that users will need to be retrained, and the differences...