Tucson - CDEX device detects medication errors

Arizona Daily Star 4/20/09

CDEX ValiMed device ensures medication, dosage are correct
By Dan Sullivan
ARIZONA DAILY STAR

Medication errors can be both deadly and costly, but one local company has developed a high-tech device to help solve the problem.

CDEX Inc., a 20-employee company at 4555 S. Palo Verde Road, has developed ValiMed, a gadget that can detect medication errors and failures in regulatory guidelines.

Sales began in the U.S. market, and the device is now sold worldwide.

ValiMed works by taking small samples of the medication in question — as little as 0.15 milliliter — and analyzing it in a few seconds. The device makes sure that the right drug is being used and at the right dose.

Medication errors take a personal and monetary toll every year. “People are dying every day because of this problem,” said Malcolm Philips Jr., president and CEO of CDEX. “We have become passionate about our product because we know it saves lives.” A study from the Institute of Medicine found that medication errors put 1.5 million people in danger every year and cost around $3.5 billion a year in extra medical expenses.

Human error and counterfeit drugs are a huge is­sue in the pharmaceutical field, said Peggy Carver, an associate professor of pharmacy at the University of Michigan, where the CDEX device has been used.

“If you can use technology to reduce those er­rors, it’s an added bonus,” she said. Drug theft is also a problem that the device seeks to detect. The problem arises when nurses or other health-care workers steal narcotic medication, of­ten replacing it with another substance.

About 28 million dosage units of controlled sub­stances were stolen from hospitals between 2000 and 2003, according to the Drug Enforcement Ad­ministration. The ValiMed can detect if a drug has been diluted by a thief.

The device costs around $24,000, but hospitals have the option to modify it to lower the cost, Philips said.

CDEX has also released a new version of its portable and hand-held methamphetamine detec­tor, dubbed the ID2 Meth Scanner.

The scanner uses photoemission to detect small amounts of meth.

CDEX shipped its first batch of meth scanners to law enforcement agencies Wednesday. The devices are being sold by Decatur Electronics.

Plans are in the works for CDEX to expand its scanners to detect heroin and cocaine.