Barcode Blog

At its new lab, the RFID services provider and systems integrator is using an EPC Gen 2 UHF system to protect the security of equipment, streamline the taking of inventory and demonstrate the technology’s benefits. [emphasis added]

When visitors arrive at the new headquarters and laboratory of RFID services provider and systems integrator ODIN Technologies in Ashburn, Va., they are met at the door by an RFID interrogator deployed by the company to track its own assets, and those of its clients. The reader is part of an RFID-based security and asset-tracking installation that Patrick J. Sweeney, ODIN’s president and CEO, calls “eating our own dog food.” (source)

While the evolution and widescale implementation of RFID was initially expected to be faster than it turned out, such cases often remind us that the story is far from over. RFID may not have been embraced on the retail level due to its production costs (which producers argue do not outweigh the benefits), yet it is slowly making its way into more advanced smaller-scale solutions.

Read more about how RFID is successfully leveraged on a small-scale practical level at RFID Journal.

This morning,  I came across a support forum post that struck me as very typical:

We are using NiceLabel Pro with asp.net to print on some standard 8.5 x 11 sheet of labels, we have multiple size we want to use. So we are putting each one in different tray in the printer. These labels need to be able to be sent to different Mailbox trays. 

Right now, I’ve got 15 different printers configured, and change the printer using NiceLabel application. 

Is there a better way to do this? 

A typical small enterprise situation, where the labeling is done as an afterthought. As with any business resource, the user’s lack of information likely led him to decide on a solution that’s immediately cheaper, but carries a high TCO, scales poorly, and often fails to perform up to standard.

Indeed there is a better way to do things, and the first step would be to use appropriate hardware. When deciding on a solution, usually 2 factors come to mind, cost and quality, often followed by the good ole statement of “good enough for our needs”. [Read the rest of this entry...]

The media’s love for a good disaster story is nothing new, and the frenzy that they’re cooking up over the current recession is an unprecedented one. Every day we hear about how everything’s going down the drain, and how there’s no escape from the big boogie man. The consumer is terrified and stuffing money in his socks again, which means the recession will indeed collapse and devour many of the old business giants and clumsy startups.

In order to gain some perspective, one has to look at the past. Recessions come and go as part of the normal cycle of the economy, and we’ve been looking down the barrel of recession economics a dozen times since the advent of capitalism. The global economy recovered after each one, so in the long run, there’s little to worry about.

As for individual businesses, the story is quite different. Recessions and other cataclysmic events are an inevitable test for businesses and their ability to adapt to new circumstances. While the rigid and confused ones collapse, a crisis sparks innovation and invention in others. The Great Depression (1929-1939) prompted the invention of (among others) electric razors, the chocolate chip cookie, supermarkets, nylon, and magnetic recordings. The Oil Crisis of 1973 saw the invention of the barcode, optical fibers, kevlar, personal computers, and digital cameras. All of these inventors looked at the recession and decided that they had to do something extraordinary to come out on top, rather than lay down and wait for their inevitable demise (or lobby their government for billions). [Read the rest of this entry...]

It’s a very common scenario: you have a non-local vendor who prints your barcodes. Let’s say it’s a gift card or a product package. You’ve done your due diligence: the vendor knows you hold him accountable for barcode quality: you’ve defined the expected ANSI grade and you have specified when, how and with what verifier you expect reports. All the bases are covered—so you think. Nevertheless, your customer has just notified you that your first-read rates are substandard and you might be getting fined.

How can this happen? 

Read more about the reasons and solutions at the Fotel blog, Dec 5 2008

The commission lists computer technology as the culprit for at least 25% of medication errors, several resulting in injuries to the patients.

»Most of the harmful technology-related errors involved mislabeled barcodes on medications (5 percent), information management systems (2 percent), and unclear or confusing computer screen displays (1.5 percent).«

Clearly, adopting a barcode system isn’t a quality guarantee, but merely a tool which should be applied carefully and meticulously as part of a broader quality assurance system. If all the system participating in the IT support of the operations aren’t effectively integrated and the staff isn’t appropriately trained to use the systems, the technology alone cannot provide near-faultless operation, which we would all like to see in our healthcare institutions.

This is particularly disturbing news, considering two earlier Sentinel Alerts issued by the Joint Commission in 2001, stating that the sentinel event database included 150 reported cases of wrong site, wrong person or wrong procedure surgery, of which 126 have root cause analysis information. 76% of those errors involved surgery on the wrong body part or site; 13% involved surgery on the wrong patient; and 11% involved the wrong surgical procedure. The second alert addressed medical gas mixups, where improper labeling was mentioned as the cause of one medical error.

Many hospitals have adopted barcode-tagged wristbands for patients and improved barcode tracking for medications, but aparently, several have not applied barcode labeling fully as a QA mechanism across the system.

One would expect that the hospitals where these errors occur will look into their HIS systems, and consider if simply buying the technology is an insufficient course of action, and whether they should have bought a »technological solution«, where industry professionals would make sure that the technology is applied and tested adequately.

Source: Join Commission Sentinel Alerts, Dec 11 2008

(Edit: We’ve looked into the issue on the side of NiceLabel technical support and customers, and it appears that the errors with medication labeling are likely caused by the source-labeling of medication, rather than the HIS network itself. Either way, no errors have been reported for the commonly used NiceWatch Enterprise HL7 Edition hospital labeling system)

Everyone knows why mobile phones are banned in hospitals. Right? They can interfere with medical equipment. How do we know this? Well, just about every hospital bans the use of cellphones on premises or in certain areas, and they’ve done so since the mobile phones came into our daily lives.

Now… putting the above »common knowledge« into a historical perspective may remind us of the old dramatic discussions on the effect of mobile phones on people. Do they »nuke« your brain? Do cellphones make your brain heat up if you use them too much? Can you really cook an egg if you cover it with tons of cellphones?

We’ve pretty much concluded by now that we don’t know anyone whose brain was melted by a phone, but we like to stay on the safe side regarding the more elusive EMI (electromagnetic interference) of phones in hospitals. Before continuing, let’s examine the evidence which contributed to the general agreement that MRI is indeed a hospital hazard:

• A pacemaker failed during an ambulance ride while the two-way radio was in use
• A man in a powered wheelchair was seriously injured when his chair rode off a cliff at high speed. He was several miles from a radio tower and three blocks from a busy road, where mobile radios were likely in use.
• A fetal heartbeat detector picked up local radio and CB broadcasts instead of the baby’s heartbeat

The above »evidence«, published in an FDA Consumer Magazine article in 1995 is a typical example of uncorroborated and poorly investigated hype that followed the general introduction of mobile phones. Once the would-be phenomena was picked up by articles in major newspapers and speculation ran rampant, the conclusion to ban cellphones from hospitals was a logical consequence, and the desire to protect oneself from legal liability outweighed any desires for proper testing.

[Read the rest of this entry...]