PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Uppal, Navjeet
AU  - Yasseen, Baseer
AU  - Seto, Winnie
AU  - Parshuram, Christopher S.
TI  - Drug formulations that require less than 0.1 mL of stock solution to prepare doses for infants and children
AID  - 10.1503/cmaj.100467
DP  - 2011 Mar 08
TA  - Canadian Medical Association Journal
PG  - E246--E248
VI  - 183
IP  - 4
4099  - http://www.cmaj.ca/content/183/4/E246.short
4100  - http://www.cmaj.ca/content/183/4/E246.full
SO  - CMAJ2011 Mar 08; 183
AB  - Intravenous doses of medications require formulations that permit accurate preparation and administration. Current equipment does not permit accurate measurement of volumes less than 0.1 mL. In a study of four hypothetical standard pediatric patients, we found that 28 common medications required less than 0.1 mL of available formulation to prepare the dose. In a clinical study of actual use in a pediatric intensive care unit (ICU), 5245 (7.4%) of 71 218 intravenous doses required preparation from less than 0.1 mL of stock solution. For 28.5% of the 1531 ICU admissions, at least one dose was prepared from a volume of less than 0.1 mL. Our findings identify a substantial source of dosing error. Correction will require revision of preparation methods, regulatory requirements and manufacturing practices.