Background In The Central Region we are now in the process of building a new hospital. The hospital intends to supply the wards with ready to use drugs and our primary task is to design a facility with sufficient capacity to meet their future demands. The hospital pharmacy made a business case investigating the costs/benefits of buying and operating a syringe filler at the pharmacy, focusing on the top 10 most commonly used injectable drugs.

Purpose The primary purpose of the business case was to estimate the requirements for capacity needed at the pharmacy regarding personnel, equipment and production facilities. The secondary purpose was to estimate the running costs of production, following regulations of EU-GMP rules concerning production, batch release and stability testing.

Material and methods We had four inputs to take into account: (1) baseline data from the wards; (2) fluctuation in daily use; (3) economy regarding production with longer shelf-life; and (4) new technology (equipment, usable syringes). On the basis of the first two inputs, knowledge about production time of prefilled syringes, need for facilities, personnel, equipment and stability data were calculated as an initial investment and running costs per year.

Results We calculated an annual production requirement of 120 000 prefilled syringes using a semi-automated machine to transfer it into syringes. This amount of syringes demands 9 full years’ work for 1 person. The initial investment cost amounts to €540 000 and the running costs to €975 000 a year.

Conclusion Based on the results, the hospital board has found the concept very interesting, but cannot currently meet the monetary requirement for investment.

References and/or acknowledgements Pharmacy technicians Ursula Beeck, Lone Handberg, Birgit Hein and Mette Marie Dam Jacobsen, clinical pharmacist Charlotte Arp, and others. Niels Linde Laursen.

No conflict of interest