The nurse relapsed and ultimately lost her nursing license. Her
method of diversion was simple: She went into trash cans and open
sharps containers to retrieve discarded syringes that contained a few
precious drops of fentanyl.
"People [with drug
abuse problems] will
go to any lengths to
divert," says Ms. New.
"With the kinds of
drugs, the quantities
of the substances and
the pace of the work
in a surgical setting,
you need to have a
disposal device that
reduces the risk of
diversion close to
where staff are work-
ing, so they can
immediately discard
controlled sub-
stances."
Drug disposal
devices that prevent
diversion are much
more common than
they were even a cou-
ple of years ago.
Some of the devices
are plugged into a
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