Counterfeit drugs are not only big business, they’re dangerous to consumers as well. Counterfeit medications have no quality assurance program, which means they can contain contaminants, sub-therapeutic levels of the active ingredient, the wrong active ingredient, or even no active ingredient at all. Thus they can cause more harm than good. While these medications can certainly cause problems here in the United States, it’s really the developing countries that are taking a beating.
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Author: Jerry Fahrni
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Cool Technology for Pharmacy – Sproxil
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Don’t blame the turkey
I love Thanksgiving. It’s about being with family, watching a lot of football and trying to eat my body weight in Pumpkin pie; everyone needs a goal.One of the most common things I hear around Thanksgiving time is that “turkey makes you sleepy”. When questioned about it people “in the know” say that it’s the tryptophan in the turkey that’s responsible for making everyone’s eyelids heavy. But is that true?
L-Tryptophan is an essential amino acid found in various protein rich foods such as the traditional Thanksgiving meal, i.e. turkey. The body utilizes tryptophan to help make niacin and serotonin. And as we all know, serotonin is responsible for changes in mood and is thought to affect sleep.
But does that mean that the L-tryptophan in turkey makes us sleepy? Not necessarily. Most people say it will, but they’re simply repeating what they’ve heard. Truth be told, there’s no good evidence to suggest that L-tryptophan induces sleep. In fact, the evidence in the literature is inconclusive. So based on the lack of evidence don’t blame the turkey for your post Thanksgiving meal coma. Instead, stuff your face with great food, unbutton your pants, lay on the couch to watch the games on TV and let nature take its course.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Enjoy the time with family and friends.
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Most read blog posts from last week (46)
Here’s a list of the most read blog posts on this site from the past week
- Cool Technology for Pharmacy (June 18,2009 – Alaris Smartpumps)
- Automated unit-dose packagers for acute care pharmacy
- Best iPhone / iPod Touch Applications for Pharmacists
- Who’s to blame for the lack of advancement in pharmacy automation and technology?
- Moving storage around in the “cloudâ€
- Cool Technology for Pharmacy – Practice Fusion EMR
- “What’d I miss?” – Week of November 14, 2010
- Biometric identification and facial recognition
- Using technology to advance pharmacy practice through education
- Cool Technology for Pharmacy – Baxa Repeater Pump
- Conference note taking with a tablet PC
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The outlook for mobile apps in healthcare looks bright
mobihealthnews: “The market opportunity for mobile apps in the healthcare enterprise is currently $100 million, according to a recent report from Chilmark Research. Because of the rapid evolution of mobile devices, physician demand, and the healthcare enterprise’s need to improve quality and efficiencies, the market will climb to $1.7 billion in three years time, Chilmark Research predicts.” – In case you missed it, that’s billion, with a “b”.
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“What’d I miss?” – Week of November 14, 2010
It’s been a weird week for me, people. I haven’t had much time to blog as things have been whirling past me at lightning speed. As with all things in this life some of it is good, while some of it is bad. The short of it is that I’ve left my post as IT Pharmacist at the hospital and am trying something a little bit new. Wish me luck.
On with the things that I found interesting this week.
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AirStrip OB now available for the Android OS
I first wrote about AirStrip Technologies back in December 2009. At the time all the AirStip applications were availble for the iOS. That’s all changed as the company recently announced that AirStrip OB is now available from the Android Market.
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Most read blog posts from last week (45)
Here’s a list of the most read blog posts on this site from the past week
- Cool Technology for Pharmacy (June 18,2009 – Alaris Smartpumps)
- Automated unit-dose packagers for acute care pharmacy
- Best iPhone / iPod Touch Applications for Pharmacists
- Moving storage around in the “cloudâ€
- Using technology to advance pharmacy practice through education
- Cool Technology for Pharmacy – Practice Fusion EMR
- CPOE failure modes and effects analysis brings up some good questions
- Pharmacy is missing social interaction, face time and comradery
- Barcodes on patient wristbands
- Thinix Touch UI for tablet PCs
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Who’s to blame for the lack of advancement in pharmacy automation and technology?
Without question there is a lack of advanced automation and technology in the acute care pharmacy setting. Spend some time in several acute care pharmacies if you don’t believe me. There’s clearly a need for it, but it’s just not being used.
I am a fan of automation and technology in any setting, but especially in the acute care pharmacy. I believe that the continued use, development and advancement of pharmacy technology should be a key component of any plan to change the current pharmacy practice model. Unfortunately, the situation is problematic because current pharmacy technology is either poorly designed for the needs of the pharmacy or the pharmacy in which it is used has a poorly designed workflow that doesn’t take advantage of it. Why is that? Who’s to blame; someone, anyone, no one? Valid questions.
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New device for delivering volatile anesthetics to patients in the ICU
“Volatile anesthetics like isofluorane or sevofluorane, usually used in the operating room, have a much quicker wake-up time, but the size and cost of an anesthesia machine make them impractical for use in the ICU.
Sedana Medical (Uppsala, Sweden) seems to have overcome this limitation with the introduction of the AnaConDa (Anesthetic Conserving Device). The device features a syringe pump that delivers Isofluorane or Sevofluorane to a small carbon-fiber device which goes in-line with a traditional ICU ventilator. In many ways, this can be considered a disposable anesthetic vaporizer.
This month’s Anesthesia & Analgesia features a study that validated this device in an ICU setting and found that it is quite accurate (end-tidal concentration was within 13% of target concentration). Advantages of this device, in addition to quick wake-ups, include lower cost of the equipment as compared to traditional vaporizers and an overall decreased consumption of anesthetic.â€When I worked in the pediatric ICU we would use volatile anesthetics like sevoflurane on rare occasion. It was always quite an ordeal as the equipment necessary to deliver the gas wasn’t exactly portable. Anyway, the AnaConDa is a pretty cool piece of hardware.
You can get more information on The AnaConDa at the product website.
