Audit on fulfillment of the European new guidelines for safety in anaesthesia practice: storage
Background and Goal of Study: The European Board of Anaesthesiology stated with the recommendations for safe medication practice that drugs should be stored in ways designed to facilitate their easy identification and minimise the risk of error or misidentification, and that local anaesthetics should be stored separately from anaesthetic drugs and high-risk i.v. medicines.The aim of our study was to evaluate the level of application of the safety guidelines in a tertiary university hospital.
Materials and Methods: We performed an observational based audit about the correct storage of diferents drugs in a Spanish tertiary hospital. We inspected all the anaesthesia trolleys (AT) and evaluated if the medication was correctly stored. 
Results and Discussion: Forty four anaesthesia stations were audited, including operating rooms and non surgical areas. In all AT inspected, at least one socket stored more than 1 medication. 8/44 (18%) ATs presented empty sockets and in 2/44 (4%), muscle relaxants were stored with no cooling system. Only 14/44 (31%) had standard labels for use on syringes of medications. In all these areas, drugs were stored without a clear distinction between different pharmacological groups: anaesthetic drugs were classified alphabetically independently from being high-risk i.v. medicines and local anesthetics.
Conclusion: These results should be used to set the basis for improvement and aim at creating a culture of safety among our colleagues. Even though the anaesthesiologists are not at charge of organizing and refilling the anaesthesia trolley in our institution, this type of survey should encourages them to take the lead in applying these practice guidelines to improve patient outcomes and reduce adverse events.
Reference: D. Whitaker et Al. The European Board of Anaesthesiology recommendations for safe medication practice. First update. Eur J Anaesthesiol 2016; 33:1-4