Jerry Fahrni

Author: Jerry Fahrni

  • IT pharmacists need more practical pharmacy experience

    I’ve laid out my pharmacy career on this site many times in the past. In a nutshell I’ve been a pharmacist for about 16 years. The first 10 years was a mix of “clinical pharmacy” and operations. The last 6 have been spent on the technology side of things; IT pharmacist for about 3 years followed by approximately 3 years with a pharmacy technology vendor.

    I will state this as clearly as possible: the time I spent as a clinician combined with my time in operations made me a better IT pharmacist.

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  • Saturday morning coffee [October 26 2013]

    “I am absolutely convinced that no wealth in the world can help humanity forward, even in the hands of the most devoted worker in this cause. The example of great and pure characters is the only thing that can produce fine ideas and noble deeds. Money only appeals to selfishness and always tempts its owners irresistibly to abuse it. Can anyone imagine Moses, Jesus, or Gandhi armed with the money-bags of Carnegie?” – Albert Einstein

    So much happens each and every week that it’s hard to keep up sometimes. Here are some of the tabs that are open in my browser this morning along with some random thoughts….

    MUG_SMC
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  • Podcast | The Garage – Episode 1

    Welcome to The Garage, a podcast of me and my brother talking about various things.  We have great conversations and have talked about recording them for years. We finally decided to do it.

    In Episode 1 of The Garage we talk about smartphones, cloud storage, Office 365, a bit about healthcare, tablets – mostly the new iPad Air and iPad Mini – the use of RSS, and data consumption. In other words, we’re all over the board.

    Forgive my heavy nose breathing as I had no idea that I sounded like a bull snorting before a charge. I’ll work on that.
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  • Quick Hit: The unspoken contributor to drug shortages, strategic overstock

    The other day I discovered a new term being thrown around in pharmacy circles, and that term is “strategic overstock”. The best way to describe strategic overstock is to call it what it is, i.e. hoarding. Of course healthcare systems don’t want you to call it hoarding because that would be considered inappropriate so they created a term that makes people think they’re doing something positive; marketing spin, if you will.

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  • What are you looking for in a “workflow management system” for the IV room?

    A recent “I’ve been thinking…” by Mark Neuenschwander got me thinking; no pun intended. Mark and I have been working on a barcode medication preparation (BCMP) project for the last couple of months. My interest in pharmacy automation and technology coupled with his passion for barcoding in healthcare and patient safety have created a good working relationship. We’re currently looking at the state of BCMP as it relates to compounding in the IV room.
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  • Saturday morning coffee [October 12 2013]

    “Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws.” – Plato

    So much happens each and every week that it’s hard to keep up sometimes. Here are some of the tabs that are open in my browser this morning along with some random thoughts….

    MUG_SMC
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  • Quick Hit: Thoughts on NEPS labeling solution for pharmacy

    I wrote about the NEPS labeling solution for pharmacy way back in May of 2009. The product basically extends the functionality of the pharmacy information system by giving users the ability to print custom labels for medications through the use of different fonts, colors, and images. It’s well thought of in certain pharmacy circles. In the hands of the right people NEPS can be an effective way to create some pretty cool labels. In the hands of others it’s a good way to create confusion.
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  • Saturday morning coffee [October 5 2013]

    “Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.” – Arthur Schopenhauer

    So much happens each and every week that it’s hard to keep up sometimes. Here are some of the tabs that are open in my browser this morning along with some random thoughts….

    MUG_SMC
    (more…)

  • Homegrown medication tracking at Children’s Hospital Boston

    Children’s Hospital Boston is a 395-bed children’s hospital located in the Longwood Medical Center area of Boston Massachusetts. It’s a pretty cool place near Harvard School of Medicine as well as the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences; not to mention that it’s literally right across the street from the famous Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

    I’ve had the pleasure of visiting Children’s Hospital and receiving a grand tour of the pharmacy and all its operations. The Pharmacy Director and IT Pharmacist have a great vision for what can be accomplished with the appropriate use of pharmacy automation and technology. They’re both quite practical about their decisions in this area.

    The pharmacy itself makes great use of technology like the Cerner Pharmacy Information System, carousels, high-speed automated packagers, DoseEdge IV Workflow Management system, as well as a homegrown medication tracking system, which I found fascinating. The medication tracking system has been in use for some time now. Children’s built the system themselves, which makes it all the more impressive. You just don’t see that kind of thing these days.

    The Director of Pharmacy at Children’s Hospital Boston provided me with a link to the YouTube video below. The video shows the nuts and bolts of their medication tracking system. While not detailed, it’ll give you a general idea of what it does.

  • Getting creative with pharmacy labels: dosing calculations

    I was searching for inpatient pharmacy label examples, specifically IV label examples, for a project that I’m working on and came across a site called RxLabelToolkit.com. It’s a neat little site that offers quite a bit of information on label design. I don’t know if the business is still active as the most recent post I can find on their blog is from December, but it’s worth a few minutes of your time to stop and have a look.

    RxLabelToolkit.com: “One of the most valuable features of BarTender for pharmacy, is the ability to perform pharmaceutical calculations right within the label application. This allows us to build a label that can calculate a dose, an infusion rate, expiration date or a taper schedule. Any mathematical formula needed can be performed right in the label application.”

    The site has some pretty cool examples. The ampicillin label below is my favorite. There’s also a brief slide presentation that walks you through all the fields on the example label.

    Ampicillin1gmLabel