Jerry Fahrni

Category: Barcoding

  • Combination RFID – Bar code reader from Motorola

    Looks like Motorola is upping the ante a bit in the portable scanner game. They recently introduced a combination bar code scanner and RFID reader for use at the point of care. It’s not pretty, and the name could use a little marketing help, but it offers some interesting functionality. A combination scanning devices like this could be just what the healthcare industry needs as we continue to move forward with BPOC / BCMA and start investigating the expanded role of RFID tags in patient safety.
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  • Cool Technology for Pharmacy – QR Codes

    Last night I was reading through some tweets and ran across this one from @ahier. Of course this led me to the referenced article on Microsoft Tags. It was a very interesting article, but for reasons I can’t explain I started thinking about a conversation I had with some people at the unSUMMIT regarding the use of QR Codes. And like all people with a short attention span I fired up Google and started searching for information on QR Codes. Fascinating stuff.
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  • Hey, anyone seen a unit-dose around here?

    When you ask a pharmacist what a unit-dose is you may get a funny look. Actually, you will get a funny look. I know because I asked one of the pharmacists I work with that very question today and she gave me a look that could only be described as a cross between concern and pity. She thought the answer to my question was obvious and who could blame her.
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  • Interesting similarity, don’t you think?

    I finally got around to digging into the article on bar code medication administration (BCMA) in the most recent issue of the NEJM. It’s and interesting article that has already receiving a lot of press. It will probably be tossed around for months.

    One thing I found amusing in the article was figure 1 on page 1706 (bottom image). I’ve had a similar visual on one of my office whiteboards (top image) for nearly a year. I like being on the same page with intelligent people.

  • Update from day two at the unSUMMIT

    Today was the first full day of unSUMMIT activity and I found myself picking up quite a bit of useful information. I didn’t attend every session, but managed to make the most of the ones I did. Even though the conference is billed as bedside barcoding I found that many of the presentations went beyond barcoding to include clinical decision support, techniques for education, troubleshooting tips and tips on how to best create a multi-disciplinary team for project planning and implementation. 
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  • Headed for the unSUMMIT (#unSUM10)

    I’m sitting in the airport waiting to board my flight for Atlanta to attend the unSUMMIT. This will be my first time attending the unSUMMIT and I’m getting pretty excited about it; like I get before every conference I attend.

    The unSUMMIT is billed as a place to get information on barcode point-of-care technology (BPOC), also known as barcode medication administration (BCMA). The promotional material for the unSUMMIT states that “attendees are outfitted with practical tools, insight, and inspiration for leading their institutions to carefully select, implement, and harness the quality-improvement power of BPOC systems.”. I could benefit from that.

    Our facility uses barcoding technology in the pharmacy and recently went live on the floor with BCMA. Some of my thoughts on the implementation can be found here. However, the work doesn’t stop after implementation; in fact the workload has increased since going live.

    Barcoding technology has been around for a couple of decades, but its use in healthcare is still in its infancy. The scope of barcoding goes beyond patient safety, which has been called into question by some, to encompass inventory tracking and management, medication usage and real-time medication administration data for pharmacists. It’s hard to say whether the technology will ever be the magic bullet everyone wants it to be, but it deserves the same attention we give all technologies that have potential to impact patient care, positively or negatively.

    I’m looking forward to hearing the closing keynote by Barbara Olson; Twitterer (@SafetyNurse) , blogger and director of patient safety at HCA. Some other items of interest include the following sessions:

    – “Alert, Alert, Alert! Effective Layering of Clinical Decision Support Tools of a Hospital’s Medication Delivery System”

    – “Alternatives to Barcodes in Medication Administration – RFID and RTLS”

    – “Optimizing Patient Safety Utilizing BPOC Metrics”

    – “Intravenous Interoperability: Combining Intelligent Infusion, BPOC, and eMAR”

    – “Observation-Based Medication-Error Detection”

    – “It’s Not “Sophie’s Choice”: Creating and Sustaining Work Processes That Enhance Medication Safety at the Point of Care.”

    The entire list of  unSUMMIT conference sessions can be found here.

    To keep everyone up to date on what’s going on I will be using the 140 character gorilla of social media, i.e. Twitter, while at the unSUMMIT along with Susan Carr and Barbara Olson. I’ll be there all week so feel free to follow the action using #unSUM10. Should be a real hoot.

  • 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 – CHS 7X

    Bar-Code Point-Of-Care (BPOC), also known as Bar-Code Medication Administration (BCMA) has been a hot topic in health care for a while now. Some people love it while others hate it. Regardless of how you feel about bar-coding it is here to stay for a while and the technology, both hardware and software, is pretty cool.
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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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  • BCMA Implementation checklist and lessons learned

    First off let me start by saying that I think BCMA is a worthwhile endeavor. It can have a positive impact on a healthcare system, not only in terms of safety, but with inventory management and billing . The other nice benefit is the ability to see the medication administration in “real-time”. Pharmacists can look at vancomycin and aminoglycoside administration times online now instead of going to the paper chart, for example. And isn’t that the whole idea behind electronic documentation? I think so.

    Our facility went live with out first BCMA unit last week. It’s still early, but my initial take is that things went fairly well. We had a few minor issues, but nothing that couldn’t be handled easily and quickly. No matter how well you plan for something there will always be some bumps in the road, and that is important to note.

    Below are some things that I picked up along the road to implementation. Some of these things we did well and some we didn’t do at all. This list is my opinion and not the gospel on BCMA implementation by any stretch of the imagination. Please remember that as you read through it.
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