The
system for monitoring and dispensing medical items which are dispensed for administration to patients includes a
data terminal (76, 338) which is connected through a network (82, 328) to at least one
remote computer (84, 324) having a processor and a
data store. The
system also includes a reading device (348) which is connected to the network. A user of the
data terminal or the reading device is enabled to select a patient for whom medical items will be used, and responsive to a request to dispense items the requested items are dispensed from dispensing devices (96, 100, 344, 346, 450, 527) connected to the
data terminal. A report generating device (384) generates reports (388) which include
machine readable indicia corresponding to patients and / or medical items. Users may select patients and dispense medications by reading the indicia from the reports using the reading device. Certain storage locations are also labeled with
machine readable indicia which may be read to indicate the taking of items therefrom as well as to indicate inventory status information. One such dispensing device in the
system is a refrigerator (450) which is retrofit with a refrigerator lock module (452) which selectively enable access to medical items stored in an interior area thereof.