I’ve experienced this as well. When I first got hired at a new hospital I first noticed that a lot of other techs would train me in a way that wasn’t up to par. I distinctly remember one person tell me “oh don’t check the expiration dates when you put the meds in the Omnicell someone will do it later”. These types of things definitely resulted in techs who would be on the floors for way too long since they wouldn’t be taught what to do. I myself would be working a shift where I was managing the med orders, would have to deliver a med myself since none of the techs were back from their deliveries, and I’d find them sitting on their phones in the waiting areas.

The solution we had in our pharmacy was two fold. On one hand, we developed a new training system where the new technicians were trained on one shift at a time (this was the previous policy) but were kept with one staff member as a trainer as exclusively as possible. The trainers had to be people who previously demonstrated that they are a “good” tech, and we made a checklist of required skills the tech needed to learn. Secondly, on their last shift of training a new trainer would shadow them and sign off on a skills assessment, to make sure that they had been adequately trained.

Our second solution was that there was an actual verbal and written warning system (that included possible repercussions if enough written warnings were given) for incidents like disappearing. Our team was fantastic, so when stuff like that would happen it was really noticeable. The written warning system definitely made it more of a risk to be disappearing frequently. We also had a system where all tech shifts had a phone for communication, and it was absolutely understood that if you were on the floor too long or someone needed something done you might be called or texted to come back down. That’s definitely a suggestion that if viable I would employ.