RESUMO
INTRODUCTION: Infliximab, a chimeric monoclonal antibody to tumour necrosis factor alpha, is administered as an intravenous infusion requiring a costly hospital day case or inpatient admission. METHODS: An audit of all current therapies given by intravenous infusions in an outpatient setting in St Vincent's University Hospital (SVUH) was undertaken. Furthermore, in conjunction with TCP homecare, we established in a general practise health clinic, the first Irish community infusion centre for the administration of infliximab in August 2006. RESULTS: All outpatient departments indicated that they would favour a centralized hospital infusion unit. There were no adverse events and the mean global satisfaction improved in the community infliximab infusion pilot programme of seven patients. CONCLUSION: This study suggests efficiencies in providing centralized infusion facilities, while the community based infusion of infliximab is feasible and safe in this small cohort and identifies the community infusion unit as a viable and cost efficient alternative for administration of infliximab.
Assuntos
Assistência Ambulatorial/estatística & dados numéricos , Anticorpos Monoclonais/administração & dosagem , Departamentos Hospitalares/estatística & dados numéricos , Infusões Intravenosas/estatística & dados numéricos , Adulto , Anticorpos Monoclonais/economia , Centros Comunitários de Saúde , Feminino , Humanos , Infliximab , Irlanda , Masculino , Pessoa de Meia-Idade , Projetos Piloto , Inquéritos e QuestionáriosRESUMO
The purpose was to determine the average transfer time taken for acute patients to arrive to the medical unit from the time of referral by an A/E officer. We included the first 200 consecutive patients with completed records. 86 were men and 114 women, aged between 14 and 96 years. Transfer time was calculated as the difference from the time of referral by the A/E officer in UCHG to the time of arrival to the medical unit in MPH. The average transfer time for all patients was 91.5 minutes. The longest was in the second (17:00-24:00) interval with a mean of 105 minutes. 26.5% of patients arrived later than 2 hours after referral. Our findings confirm the existence of unacceptably long transfer time for a significant number of patients. Causes for this delay should be searched for to help find and implement solutions.
