Last year at this time, we were reflecting on one year of USP <800> enforcement. Little did we know that NIOSH would release an updated list of hazardous drugs and also a new format consisting of two main tables. Welcome to 2025! Each year, we review the top 5 Rpharmy Safety First blogs, which offer insight into the topics pharmacists, nurses, medication safety officers, and other healthcare workers focused on. While many things changed this year, some things stay the same.
And now we present the Top Blogs of 2025:
From Our Customers: The Top 8 Questions To Expect In Joint Commission Inspections
This is an oldie but a goodie! It ranked at the top of the list last year and remains there this year.
Originally published in January 2021, this blog shares feedback from our clients who underwent inspections focused on preventing healthcare workers from being exposed to hazardous drugs. Topics such as Look-Alike, Sound-Alike, Antibiotic Stewardship Employee Training and documentation, and more are just as relevant today as they were nearly five years ago.
We published an updated version of this blog in September 2024, and we will do the same this year. If you’re on our email list, be on the lookout for a short survey asking for feedback on your recent Joint Commission inspection.
Breaking Down NIOSH 2024: Antineoplastic Reclassification and Biologic Handling Updates
As noted in the intro, NIOSH began the new year in a state of urgency as healthcare systems and facilities quickly assessed their lists and reorganized to align with the new two-table structure.
As the blog noted, our own Sherlene Christen went right to work organizing our clients’ hazardous drug lists based on the NIOSH 2016 list, and then shared the updates required to align with the NIOSH 2024 list.
Because we work closely with our customers, we understand the (welcome) wrench NIOSH threw into the mix. Of course, everyone was eager to get the latest from NIOSH after many years without updates, but this resulted in significant manual work to update hazardous drug lists, reorganize tables, and update (potentially hundreds of) Assessments of Risk and EHR platforms.
Given that this blog was the second most-read in 2025, we hope it was a helpful resource as you updated your hazardous drug list.
And it dovetails nicely into the next most popular blog.
Assessments of Risk - A Recap of the USP <800> Preparedness Lunch + Learn
As you were working to align with the new NIOSH list, you were likely neck-deep in updating Assessments of Risk.
This blog is a recap of a 2023 webinar that could have been titled "AoRs 101." We shared experiences from our own customers and the choices they make around which drugs get an AoR, what information needs to be included, with images of example AoRs to boot.
We’re grateful that this more than two-year-old blog has held its value and served as a resource for many of you. If you want to check out the Lunch and Learn webinars, you can find the recordings here.
Also from 2023, this blog certainly serves a purpose. We originally wrote it to address questions about which drugs should be on a “Do Not Crush” list after ISMP discontinued its resource.
Without this helpful guidance, many healthcare systems and hospitals were left to wade through “package inserts, drug manufacturer inquiries, tertiary drug information resources, and primary literature,” as ISMP suggested at the time.
Because we believe safety policies are most likely to be followed when they are easily accessible and easy to understand, we help clients include their “Do Not Crush List” in their Rhazdrugs and Formweb sites.
6 Factors For Identifying Hazardous Drugs in Your Organization
In 2022, we helped clients identify hazardous drugs because NIOSH had not issued an update since 2016. This blog is in line with the other top blogs of the year as healthcare systems and facilities worked overtime to ensure their hazardous drug lists were up to date before the Joint Commission, State Boards of Health or other accreditation agency came a knocking.
While this year’s NIOSH update threw most organizations into frenzy, as we said in this blog, “The hazardous drug addition and review cycle is continuous and requires a systemic process to ensure this vitally important requirement is fluid and always up to date.”
What is your process for reviewing the existing list of hazardous drugs? How has it changed this year? We’d love to know.
It’s always fun to go down memory lane through the blogs you read the most this year. We’ll revisit these topics and see where we can provide new guidance and support.
As always, we would love to hear about your 2025 challenges and wins, and any way we can help you do the vital work of protecting patients and healthcare workers.
See you in 2026!
