Dr Jorge Garcia Addresses the Importance of Ambulatory Drug Infusion

Jorge Garcia, PharmD, MS, MHA, MBA, FACHE, assistant vice president of system oncology and infusion pharmacy services, Baptist Health South Florida, spoke about his panel on ambulatory drug infusion that was featured at the recent Institute for Value-Based Medicine (IVBM) held in Newport Beach, California, cohosted by The American Journal of Managed Care and Providence Health System.

Transcript

What were you most looking forward to at the IVBM conference in Newport Beach?

I think what I'm most excited about is just coming together with colleagues to understand how they're working through different challenges and opportunities in their respective facilities and what I can bring back to my home institution to continue to advance health care.

What can attendees expect from your presentation on ambulatory drug infusion?

Over the years, I have sometimes gotten phone calls about patients who need nononcology infusion therapy. Sometimes the providers will call directly and they would ask me, "Help me find a share to infuse this patient, otherwise I may need to bring the patient through the Emergency Department. Or even worse, I may need to get the patient admitted."

As we know, that's not ideal, using those acute health care resources for an infusion that could otherwise be provided to the patient in the ambulatory setting. So with that vision in mind, we have put in practice a new service line that looks at ambulatory infusions for patients. Now we've operated the centers for 3 years, and we've learned a lot along the way; we've definitely opened access. We would love to share our experiences, our successes, and the challenges that we continue to work through to ensure that there is good access to nononcology infusion medicines in our community.