Expired Medication Not Discarded from Medication Cart
Penalty
Summary
Nursing staff failed to discard an expired medication in a timely manner, as observed during a medication pass on Unit 2. An employee retrieved a house stock bottle of famotidine 10 mg from a medication cart to administer to a resident. The bottle had an open date of March 4, 2025, but the manufacturer expiration date was January 2025, indicating the medication was opened and used after its expiration. The employee did not check the expiration date before preparing the medication for administration, and confirmed during an interview that the bottle had been in use past its expiration date, with no other bottles available in the cart. Facility policies require nursing staff to maintain medication storage areas in a safe and sanitary manner and to check expiration dates prior to administering medications. Both the Nursing Home Administrator and the Director of Nursing confirmed that the medication should not have been used past its expiration date. The surveyor's findings were based on policy review, direct observation, and staff interviews, and the expired medication was found to be approximately one-third full at the time of discovery.