CVS acknowledges a prescription error
Too much insulin is given to toddler
CVS Pharmacy has admitted it made a mistake when filling a prescription last week, causing a Whitman toddler to have a frightening reaction.
Deborah Fairfield picked up prescriptions for her 2-year-old daughter, Kaylee, at the CVS Pharmacy at Children's Hospital Boston on Wednesday after the girl had been diagnosed April 23 with diabetes. ''She was diagnosed on Sunday, and we were scared to death and then, on top of that, this," Fairfield said yesterday in a telephone interview.
Fairfield thought that the bottle of insulin looked odd when she went to give Kaylee her first dose on Wednesday. She said she immediately called the pharmacy and was assured the dosage was correct. On Friday, a visiting nurse from Children's came to the Fairfields' home and discovered that the dosage was too high. Kaylee's blood sugar levels had spiked, and the child was acting ''off the wall," Fairfield said, uncharacteristically hyperactive, with difficulty sleeping.
The nurse corrected the dosage, and Kaylee, who is not expected to suffer any permanent harm, is recovering, Fairfield said yesterday.
In a statement on its website, CVS said: ''The health and safety of our customers is our highest priority, and we work extremely hard to eliminate the possibility of prescription errors. We deeply regret the incident that occurred at our pharmacy, and we have extended our sincere apologies to the Fairfield family."
The statement also said CVS, the largest pharmacy chain in Massachusetts, has begun an investigation into the incident and will cover any medical expenses incurred as a result of it.
CVS pharmacy ''dispensed the wrong prescription 62 times in 2005," the Massachusetts Board of Pharmacy reported. In February, the pharmacy agreed to be overseen by the Institute of Safe Medication Practices, a nonprofit patient safety group, to evaluate its protocols for filling prescriptions.
Fairfield said she does not want the incident to be swept under the rug. ''My main thing is that I don't want this to be washed away. We don't know how to handle this, how to go about this. I don't want them to say 'free prescriptions or money.' I want to work with CVS. They need to make this right," Fairfield said.
A spokesperson for Children's Hospital Boston said officials there would not comment while CVS is investigating.
