Pharma Care

Most of the wide variety of medications used in LGH’s Oncology Clinic are prepared daily onsite in the Oncology Pharmacy, in a special environment known as a “chemo hood.”

Also known as a biosafety cabinet, the clinic’s two chemo hoods enable pharmacist technicians to handle and prepare cytotoxic agents and other hazardous drugs used to treat various cancers, while protecting staff and the surrounding environment from the dangerous materials.

With the size of the Oncology Pharmacy set to almost triple – from 529 sq ft to 1,400+ sq ft – the Pharmacy team will be able to purchase three much-needed new hoods.

The hoods will allow more chemotherapy to be prepared and prevent service disruptions if one needs maintenance. An extra hood will also enable LGH to support other chemotherapy pharmacies across Metro Vancouver when their services are disrupted during emergencies and natural disasters.

According to Clinical Pharmacy Specialist Dawn Warkentin, the new chemo hoods will be just one of the many benefits to expanding the size of the Oncology Clinic.

“Being able to purpose-build this new space will make a huge difference,” she explains. “The current space isn’t just extremely small for the number of patients we care for, the treatments that we’re doing today, are very different from how Oncology operated 20 years ago.”