Medication Additive Labels

Description

General Principles
All bags, bottles or syringes which contain a medicine must be labelled.
Only one medicine should be prepared and labelled at a time. Each injectable medicine drawn up in a
bag/bottle or syringe should be prepared and labelled as a single operation by the same person.
Labelling must be applied to the container immediately after the medicine is prepared.
Any medicine that is not labelled must be discarded and re-prepared.
Fluid Bags and Bottles
All bags/bottles must be labelled immediately when an injectable medicine is added.
Bag/bottle additive labels should be placed on the front of the bag in a way that ensures that the name
of the base fluid, batch number and expiry date remain visible.
Bag/bottle labels are available in 2 sizes. The larger size fits the 500mL – 1 litre bags/bottles, while the
smaller label fits the 50mL and 100mL bags/bottles.
Fluid bags and bottles for infusion where no additional injectable medicines are added prior to
administration, e.g. intravenous fluids or other pre-mixed and labelled solutions do not require
additional labelling.
All premix solutions for pain management where no additional drugs are added must have an
appropriate route label (epidural, intravenous) attached indicating patient name, date and time the bag
was hung including the two checking clinicians signatures. The colour coded additive label will be used
with a line strike through the box for adding drugs and the word premix written.
Syringes
All injectable medicines drawn up in a syringe should be labelled immediately using the state standard
pre-printed labels which are colour coded to indicate the route of administration.
Labels should be placed parallel to the long axis of the syringe barrel with the top edge flush with (but
not covering) the graduations