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I’ve been thinking about minding the gap, looking right, and a potential blindspot in the medication-use process.
There is little pedestrian about being a pedestrian in the UK. It pays to heed the painted warnings underfoot between the platforms and trains throughout the color-coded labyrinth of the famed Underground—“MIND THE GAP.” It is paramount, however, to heed the painted curbs at nearly every intersection—“LOOK RIGHT.” Perhaps you’ve had your close call with…
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I’ve been thinking about SOS, shingles, and the v-word.
SOS is the worldwide signal for distress. When originally used in 1908, the letters did not represent words. Rather, the characters were chosen for the ease with which they could be telegraphed and deciphered via Morse Code. The signal employs perhaps the least ambiguous combinations available: dot-dot-dot, dash-dash-dash, and dot-dot-dot.The maritime call letters quickly evolved into an…
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January 2015—2014 ASHP MidYear Meeting Technology Wrap-Up
I’ve been thinking about my twenty-first American Society of Health-System Pharmacists’ (ASHP) Midyear Clinical Meeting and Exhibition in Anaheim, December 8-9. My first ASHP was Miami in 1995—the same year the society announced that the “h” in its abbreviated name would henceforth stand for Health-System rather than Hospital as documented on its birth certificate. Recognizing…
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I’ve been thinking about drugs, wars, Christmases, and your hospital (the one you work in and/or the one you go to as a patient).
On my daily walks, I’ve been listening to Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. I’m at Christmas of 1943—the year Bing Crosby’s newly recorded “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” began tugging at souls on radios across America. The tug persists. Though the bestseller’s central figure, Louis Zamperini, did…
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Preventing Medical Errors with Proven Bar-Code Technology
Bar-code technologies, which have proven effective at points-of-sale in stores and during order-fulfillment in warehouses are preventing errors at points-of-care and during medication preparations in hospitals. A US television commercial for Berlitz language courses begins with a senior officer briefing a draftee on how to man the station before leaving him on his own. No…
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I’ve been thinking about Tina, Sarah, slinkies, and how improv may improve your group’s productivity.
I’ve been thinking about Tina, Sarah, slinkies, and how improv may improve your group’s productivity. During the 2008 presidential campaign, I thought Tina Fey did a good Sarah Palin—so good that when the governor from Alaska joined the comedian on Saturday Night Live, it seemed as if Tina Palin and Sarah Fey were impersonating each…
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I’ve been thinking about presidents, engineers, nurses, and the law of unintended consequences
The bulk of the word consequence is sequence. In sequence, outcomes (intended or not) follow actions. Typically, consequences is used in reference to negative outcomes. In 1974, Richard Nixon had neither intended nor anticipated the devastating sequence of events that would follow the Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up. He had not expected his actions would…
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I’ve Been Thinking About: Presidents, Engineers, Nurses, and the Law of Unintended Consequences
The bulk of the word consequence is sequence. In sequence, outcomes (intended or not) follow actions. Typically, consequences is used in reference to negative outcomes. In 1974, Richard Nixon had neither intended nor anticipated the devastating sequence of events that would follow the Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up. He had not expected his actions would…