Jerry Fahrni

Category: Automation

  • Participating in the ASHP Summer Meeting from afar #ashpsm10

    The inability to physically be in Tampa, FL shouldn’t stop someone from participating in the ASHP Summer Meeting. Technology doesn’t care that I’m 2700 miles away or that I’m sitting in my home in my bunny slippers with Diet Pepsi in hand. With a webcam and speaker phone I was able to join a user group discussion held by Talyst.
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  • Update on AutoPharm software only pilot

    A couple of months ago we became a beta site for a Talyst AutoPharm software only solution. It’s not really a “software only” solution as it consists of a POS-X PC117 workstation, a Code CR3 scanner and a Zebra ZM400 printer, and of course Talyst’s AutoPharm software, but there are no carousels attached to it.
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  • Carousel technology article in AJHP

    AJHP: “Implementation and evaluation of carousel dispensing technology in a university medical center pharmacy (Am J Health Syst Pharm 2010 67: 821-829)

    Results. The estimated labor savings comparing the preimplementation and postimplementation time studies for automated dispensing cabinet (ADC) refills, first-dose requests, supplemental cart fill, and medication procurement totaled 2.6 full-time equivalents (FTEs). After departmental reorganization, a net reduction of 2.0 technician FTEs was achieved. The average turnaround time for stat medication requests using CDT was 7.19 minutes, and the percentage of doses filled in less than 20 minutes was 95.1%. After implementing CDT, the average accuracy rate for all dispense requests increased from 99.02% to 99.48%. The inventory carrying cost was reduced by $25,059.

    Conclusion. CDT improved the overall efficiency and accuracy of medication dispensing in a university medical center pharmacy. Workflow efficiencies achieved in ADC refill, first-dose dispensing, supplemental cart fill, and the medication procurement process allowed the department to reduce the amount of technician labor required to support the medication distribution process, as well as reallocate technician labor to other areas in need. ”

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  • Today’s presentation on pharmacy automation

    The health care system I work for, Kaweah Delta Health Care District, uses quite a bit of automated technology from Talyst in our inpatient pharmacy. Well, today I spent the day in Bellevue, WA with the good folks from Talyst talking about all kinds of pharmacy automation and technology.

    The day started with me giving a brief presentation at their quarterly meeting about Kaweah Delta’s experience installing Talyst equipment, and ended with a tour of their warehouse facility in Preston that included a peak at their process for managing and testing canisters for their AutoPack Oral Solid Packaging System; very interesting stuff.

    Talyst was a wonderful host and I had a great time visiting their facilities and speaking with a bunch of very intelligent and interesting people. I learned a lot and had fun at the same time. You can’t ask for more than that.

    View more presentations from Jerry Fahrni.
  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy – BoxPicker

    Cool Technology for Pharmacy – BoxPicker

    The Swisslog BoxPicker is an automated alternative to carousel technology for drug storage and retrieval. Unlike the open shelf architecture of automated carousel storage the BoxPicker offers access to medications via a single-opening/loading drawer process.

    Once you get past the name, the technology is impressive. The most interesting thing about the Swisslog BoxPicker however, is that it is available in dual-temperature and refrigerated models. The “dual-temperature ™ option for BoxPicker allows automated storage and picking of temperature-sensitive drugs requiring refrigeration and room temperature storage within one automated compact unit.” And the “BoxPicker refrigerated option eliminates the need for pharmacy refrigerators and increases security with automated storage and dispensing of refrigerated medications.”

    In addition, the BoxPicker is clean room compatible with positive pressure. The pass-through capability is a very nice feature for an automated storage unit featuring refrigeration. It prevents staff from moving in and out of the clean room environment to retrieve equipment or medications necessary for compounding.
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  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy – AutoPharm

    Our facility utilizes several software and hardware products from Talyst to manage our pharmacy inventory and support our goal of bar coding 100% of the pharmacy inventory. The entire system consists of the Talyst AutoCarousel system for automated carousel storage, their AutoPharm software for inventory management, their AutoPack system for packaging and bar coding our bulk medications, and their AutoLabel system for generating bar coded labels for items that aren’t bar coded from the manufacturer or whose bar codes aren’t easily read.
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  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy

    In a previous post I mused about using an automated packaging system like InSite from Talyst as a type of automated dispensing cabinet for acute care patients. InSite was designed for long-term care and would simply be too large for the needs of an acute care nursing unit, but the technology is ideal.

    However, the ATP-71 (PDF) from Swisslog is a bulk packager that can hold up to 71 canisters in a relatively small footprint: 31.5 inches wide x 29.6 inches deep x 30.6 inches high. For comparison, a Pyxis MedStation 4000 2-drawer main unit is 22.8 inches wide x 26.7 inches deep x 27.7 inches high. I would say that makes the two units comparable in terms of size, and I can tell you from personal experience that a 2-drawer main isn’t very big up close.
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  • Talyst goes live with new customer portal

    Talyst has been beta-testing a new customer portal for several months now. The idea was introduced to Talyst customers at their user group meeting during the ASHP Summer Meeting in Chicago last June. Beta-testing took place between the summer meeting and December 2009 when Talyst unveiled the portal to a larger user group meeting in Las Vegas at the ASHP Midyear. Attendees were given a demonstration of the portal and offered an opportunity to provide feedback on possible issues or features they’d like to see. Well, it appears that the portal is out of the beta phase and ready for use.


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  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy

    IV Automation / Robotics

    Today I attended a webinar from Baxa titled “Improving Sterile Compounding Quality Through Automation” given by Eric Kastango RPh, MBA, FASHP. The presentation was very interesting. I thought it was going to focus more on technology, but it was heavy on the human component of contamination in the clean room environment with only minor mention of automated IV devices. Anyway, during the presentation Kastago talked a bit about robotic automation for clean rooms and mentioned the CytoCare Robot.

    The CytoCare Robot is a chemotherapy compounding robot in an ISO class 5 environment. According to the website CytoCare is “the world’s first and only automated robotic system for the safe compounding of hazardous, life-critical cancer therapy medications.”


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  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy

    The DoseEdge Pharmacy Workflow Manager, formerly IntelliFlowRx Workload Management Software by Baxa, is a system designed to track and manage intravenous (IV) medication dosages prepared by pharmacy personnel in a clean room environment. The system is touted as “The world’s first and only fully integrated workflow manager for the IV room.”

    The system is designed to flow something like this:

    – IV medication orders entered by the pharmacist, or other healthcare professional, are sent to the DoseEdge system where they appear on the DoseEdge touchscreen.
    – When the technician, or pharmacist in some cases, accesses the order via the touchscreen instructions for preparation of the product are displayed.
    – The product label is generated.
    – The barcode on each injectable ingredient used for the preparation of the IV product is scanned to ensure the correct medications have been selected. Items identified as incorrect result in an audible message of “product not allowed for this dose.”
    – The barcode on the IV product label generated by the pharmacy is scanned to ensure that ingredients are appropriately matched.
    – Each ingredient is drawn into a syringe.
    – An image of the syringe with appropriately drawn medication is taken for review by the pharmacist, or technician, whichever the case may be. This is a nice feature as it allows one to see the actual amount of drug drawn into the syringe prior to shooting it into the fluid bag.
    – Ingredients are injected into the fluid bag and an image of the final product is taken.
    – A final scan of the product barcode is done to complete the fill.

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