December 17, 2003

Dear Colleagues:

You may have read in an article published in The Sun today that the Johns Hopkins Home Health Care Group’s infusion service has “shut down” due to the death of a pediatric patient receiving total parenteral nutrition. We wish to assure our patients and families that this is NOT the case. The infusion service continues to operate fully with the exception of total parenteral nutrition services for approximately 20 patients, which are now being prepared at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, as an added safety precaution. Normal referral processes through Pediatrics At Home and Johns Hopkins Home Care Group’s Infusion Pharmacy will continue for all home infusions including TPN. The TPN solutions will be prepared by automated processing by the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center’s infusion pharmacy and the CAPS pharmacy program for adult TPN. Johns Hopkins Home Care Group will continue to coordinate, deliver and provide clinical pharmacy and nursing oversight as needed as well as operate its infusion pharmacy to prepare other infusion therapies.

While we can certainly understand your concern, we wish to emphasize that the Johns Hopkins Home Care Group’s infusion pharmacy continues to be safe. We believe this death, while certainly tragic, was an isolated incident. More than 800 people depend on the Johns Hopkins Home Care Group Infusion Pharmacy on a daily basis for many different types of infusions and there have been no incidents similar to this tragic case in the past with our infusion services.

The Johns Hopkins Home Care Group now, as in the past, remains committed to providing safe and dependable patient care. We urge that you continue to use our services as you normally would with the assurance that you will continue to enjoy the same standards of high quality and safety you have known in the past.

If you have any questions about this or related matters, please don’t hesitate to call.

Sincerely,
Steven A. Johnson
President
Johns Hopkins Home Care Group
410-288-8000