Year end thoughts for 2009

2009 brought many new and exciting changes not only in my personal life, but in the world of pharmacy and technology as well. I’ve learned many new things, gained some skills previously absent from my armamentarium, met some great new people, discovered the “real” internet for the first time, traveled more than ever before, discovered I don’t know diddly squat about a great many things, and am more excited about the next year than I can remember in recent history.

Below is a list of opinions about a great many things that I have seen and done over the past year. Some are pharmacy related, some are technology related, some are personal, and some are just random thoughts.

Best idea for acute care pharmacy – “Auto-verification” of orders with CPOE.

Best idea for new pharmacy practice model – Technology-enabled practice:
A vision statement by the ASHP Section of Pharmacy Informatics and Technology. Am J Health Syst Pharm.2009; 66: 1573-1577.

Best idea in pharmacy that has yet to mature – Clinical Surveillance software.

Best clinical surveillance software reviewed, but not purchases – Sentri7 by Pharmacy OneSource

Best drug information resource, hardcopy – Lexi-Comp Drug Information Handbook.

Best drug information resource, handheld/electronic – Lexi-Comp Lexi-Drugs & Lexi-Interact

Best pharmacokinetics calculator, handheld/electronic – RxCalc for the iPhone, of course.

Best medical reference, electronic/web based – UpToDate. (includes access to Lexi-Drugs, online version)

Biggest fall from grace – Pyxis becoming CareFusion. Unfortunately the customer service I was used to receiving from Pyxis went in the toilet when they broke away from the mother ship to form CareFusion.

Best bar code scanner used this year – Code Reader 3500. We’ve had some problems getting it to work properly with our carousel, but it is a great little bar code scanner.

Worst bar code scanner used this year – Code Reader CR3. After using the Code Reader 3500, the CR3 feels like a relic.

Biggest bar coding challenge for me this year – Figuring out how to bar code our pediatric syringes.

Most valuable data collected – Data from our Alaris smart pumps

Least useful data collected – Pharmacist intervention data collected in Siemens. We just can’t get pharmacists to record this information.

Worst software upgrade – Siemens pharmacy system. Man, was that a fiasco. I’d like to spend a little “quality time” with the developer of that system.

Best tablet that never was – The Apple iSlate. Will I purchase one when it finally hits the market? Yeah, probably.

Best mock-up of the mythical Apple Tablet. Deemed the “MacBook Touch” by Designer Tommaso Gecchelin.

Best eReader – The Nook. Say what you will, but I purchased a Nook for my daughter and it is very nice, easy to use and just plain cool.

Best applications I discovered this year – Evernote and LiveMesh. I couldn’t live without them.

Best screen capture utility – ScreenHunter

Best tablet PC I used this year – I think it has to go to my Dell XT2 Tablet PC. It’s not the perfect tablet, but I will rank it above the Motion Computing J3400, C5, and LE1700 I used this year. I already have my eye on a Lenovo X200 tablet PC for 2010. Stay tuned.

Best not-a-tablet-not-an-ereader device – The enTourage eDGe. This device is probably my next purchase.

Best tablet pc blogger on the ‘net – Warner Crocker (@WarnerCrocker) of GottaBeMobile.com.

Best UMPC blogger on the ‘net – Steve ‘Chippy’ Paine (@chippy) of UMPCPortal.com.

Best everything moble site on the ‘net – jkOnTheRun

Best new smartphone – Hands down, the Motorola Droid.

Most exciting developments in an operating system – Android. We’re seeing it in smartphones and netbooks. It will be interesting to see where it goes in 2010.

Best smartphone user interface – The iPhone. It isn’t my smartphone of choice, but it sure has a nice UI.

Best meeting/conference attended – ASHP Midyear 2009.

Best advice I received – This one came from my brother, Robert. His advice to me: “Get a Twitter account and start blogging.” Thanks, bro.

Best presentation attended – There were two presentations I attended at Midyear that really caught my attention: 1) Integrating Technology to Improve Medication-Use Patient Safety (PDF) and 2) Pharmacy 2.0: How the Web is Changing How We Practice

Best webinar attended – Pharmacy Face-Off: BCMA vs. CPOE, Which Comes First?

Best vendor I worked with this year – Talyst

Worst vendor I worked with this year – Siemens

Best RSS Reader – Google Reader

Best online collaboration tool – Google Docs

Best new thing that people won’t use – Google Wave

Best search engine – Bing is pretty solid, but Google still rules.

Best browser for Windows machine – Hmm, tough call. Firefox still has my vote, with Google Chrome a close second.

Best tablet PC software – Microsoft OneNote

Best Twitter client for the Droid – Seesmic for Android. Still waiting for a TweetDeck Android app. Do you hear me TweetDeck people?

Best Twitter client for the desktop – TweetDeck, without question.

Best desktop operating system – While I’m impressed with Windows 7, I’m forced to give the nod to Mac OS X.

Best movies at the box office – Tough one for me as Lori and I see a lot of movies. I don’t watch movies for the plot, story line or acting. I like to be entertained. So, based on that here we go:

• Underworld: Rise of the Lycans
• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
• Avatar
• X-Men Origins: Wolverine
• Star Trek – This may have been the “best”

Biggest grossing movie of 2009 – Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. It did over $400,000 at the box office.

Worst movie at the box office – Watchman. What a terrible movie; total waste of time.

Most overused word – Anything with a “2.0” in it, i.e. Web 2.0, Gov 2.0, Pharmacy 2.0, Med 2.0, Health 2.0, Cheeseburger 2.0, Coffee 2.0, etc.

Most valuable lesson learned in 2009 – Be patient.

Best thing I did for myself – Lose 40 pounds. I feel much better.

Best surprise in professional football – The Arizona Cardinals made it to the Super Bowl.

Biggest disappointment in professional football – The Arizona Cardinals lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Super Bowl.

Worst coaching decision in professional football – Bill Belichick going for it on 4th down against the colts.

Dumbest play by a professional football player, on the field – Leodis McKelvin’s decision to return a kickoff instead of taking a touchback when the Buffalo Bills were leading the Patriots in the fourth quarter of a game they had won. The fumble ultimately led to the Bills losing to the Patriots 25 – 24.

Biggest disappointment in collage football – The USC Trojans not winning the Pac-10. Bummer.

Most overrated college football player – Tim Tebow

Most overrated college football team for 2009 – The Florida Gators

Worst system in the universe to determine a sports champion – The BCS. The current bowl system is all about money and has almost nothing to do with sports.

Worst professional sport to watch on TV or in person – Major League Baseball.

Here’s to a New Year full of new and wondrous things.