Intro to EC Pharmacy

Hello everyone! My name is Katrina, and I am an incoming P3 student currently interning at Royal Oak Beaumont Hospital. I've been a pharmacy intern there for a year, working alternating weekends during school and full-time in the summer. As a pharmacy intern at Beaumont, there are several practice areas where I been trained to work, namely in the central inpatient pharmacy, satellite pharmacies (general and pediatrics), IV clean room, and in the emergency center (EC).

During the summer, I am frequently scheduled to work in the EC. Working in this setting as an intern is definitely an interesting experience in the unexpected- no day is the same. Royal Oak Beaumont has a Level I Trauma center, which translates into receiving a variety of critical patients from around Michigan in addition to local cases.

Typical daily tasks include: refilling the EMS boxes and bike packs, restocking the pharmacy, filling and delivering doses to 1 of the 8 areas of the EC, and crediting unused patient medications. Compounding IVs quickly and accurately in the EC is essential, especially for medications like TPA and amiodarone. All of the EC pharmacists that supervise my work are truly knowledgable, and are more than happy to both teach and test me on drug information and dosing while I work.

When the EC pharmacist is paged to attend the trauma bay, I usually get to tag along and help out with whatever case presenting. Most often, pharmacist involvement in traumas features intubation sequences and the provision of syringes for cardiac arrest codes. For example, during a code, the EC pharmacist is responsible for providing the nursing staff and physicians with specific medications at defined intervals of time, all depending on the patient's status. At the discretion of the EC pharmacist, interns are permitted to draw up doses on the spot for the traumas, which are immediately used after verification by the pharmacist. The pressure can be on when those around you are depending on a syringe in a few moments!

Overall, it has been rewarding to be able to experience this different side of inpatient pharmacy as a student, and I look forward to more times in the EC!