PharmE^® News Alert

NIOSH Publishes 2016 Hazardous Drug List

NIOSH has published its biennial update of the hazardous drug list and continued its practice of offering three tables of products:

• Group 1: Antineoplastic drugs;
  
• Group 2: Non-antineoplastic drugs that meet one or more of the NIOSH criteria for a hazardous drug; and
  
• Group3: Drugs that primarily pose a reproductive risk to men and women who are actively trying to conceive and women who are pregnant or breast feeding, because some of these drugs may be present in breast milk.
  

Thirty-four new drugs were added to the list since 2014 and no drugs were deleted. The publication also provides guidance on how to generate your own specific list of hazardous drugs based on drugs purchased and usage within the healthcare facility. Healthcare professionals are reminded that as new drugs enter the marketplace, they must also be evaluated based on the criteria of carcinogenicity, teratogenicity or other developmental toxicity, reproductive toxicity, organ toxicity at low doses, genotoxicity, and structure and toxicity profiles that mimic existing drugs determined hazardous by the above criteria. Table 5 of the publication provides examples of scenarios that may occur in healthcare settings and recommends appropriate engineering controls and personal protective equipment.

The NIOSH List of Antineoplastic and Other Hazardous Drugs in Healthcare Settings, 2016 can be accessed at http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/antineoplastic/pdf/hazardous-drugs-list_2016-161.pdf.

• Posted: September 13, 2016