Drug Dispense Attribution via Running Counters
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional drug ordering systems for healthcare facilities face challenges in efficiently attributing drug doses to correct container sizes and sellers, leading to increased processing costs, potential loss of pricing benefits, and unnecessary purchases at higher prices due to complex logic failures and resource-intensive dispense attribution processes.
Innovation Solution
A software and/or hardware facility that uses late attribution and price optimization, incrementing a drug-specific counter for inpatient doses and allowing 340B price reorders based on previous purchases, automatically identifying sellers and optimizing prices to simplify attribution and ensure lower pricing benefits are not discarded, enabling execution on less powerful hardware and accelerating lower price purchases.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If conventional drug ordering systems use complex logic to attribute dispense to container size and seller, then attribution accuracy may be maintained, but processing costs increase and system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by maintaining running counters that track the number of dispensed doses for each drug and seller combination in advance of the ordering decision. This pre-computation eliminates the need for complex retrospective analysis and attribution logic when placing orders, as the attribution data is already prepared and available.
Solution Approach 2:
The system serves itself by automatically tracking and updating dispense counters through integration with the dispensing system. The counters self-update whenever a drug is dispensed, eliminating the need for manual attribution processes or complex external verification systems.
2Reliability
If conventional systems perform detailed attribution processing, then pricing benefits may be preserved, but resource consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the essential information needed for pricing decisions by maintaining simple counters of dispensed doses per drug-seller combination. This extraction approach captures the critical data for determining pricing eligibility without processing unnecessary detailed attribution information, thereby reducing computational resource consumption while preserving pricing benefits.
3Measurement precision
If conventional systems use complex attribution logic, then accurate drug tracking is achieved, but processing speed decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary tracking by continuously updating dispense counters in real-time as drugs are administered. This ongoing preliminary action ensures accurate drug tracking is already in place before ordering decisions are made, eliminating the need for time-consuming retrospective analysis and enabling rapid processing of drug orders.
4Reliability
If conventional systems perform comprehensive dispense attribution, then pricing optimization opportunities are identified, but operational efficiency decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The system achieves self-service by automatically maintaining accurate dispense counters through integration with the hospital's dispensing system. This automated tracking enables continuous monitoring of dispense volumes and automatic identification of pricing optimization opportunities without requiring manual intervention or complex processing, thereby maintaining operational efficiency while ensuring pricing optimization.
Data Source
AI summary
A facility for ordering drugs is described. For each of a number of different drugs, the facility maintains a single outpatient counter of administrations of the drug to outpatients that have not been used as a basis for reordering the drug. For a distinguished one of the drugs, based on the value of the counter of administrations of the distinguished drug, the facility places an order that reorders the distinguished drug at a discounted outpatient price level.