Pharmacy Automation
摘要
The use of pharmacy automation and robotics has become commonplace during the last 20 years, especially in hospitals. This chapter outlines the adoption, functional features and benefits of pharmacy automation, looking at pharmacy robots used within the pharmacy department and automated medicine cabinets, which can control and monitor medicines use in hospital wards and departments. Hub and spoke dispensing also briefly discussed in this chapter, as this is usually enabled by pharmacy robotics. The chapter also discusses the use of remote prescription collection units, as a means of facilitating prescription collection outside pharmacy opening hours and providing remote health (telecare) services and also the use of specialist dispensing systems for methadone liquid dispensing.