Blogs

Shkreli Awards

By Dennis Tribble posted 28 days ago
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Perhaps I wear rose-colored glasses, but I was astounded by an article from Becker’s Hospital Review regarding the Lown Institute and their sixth annual Shkreli Awards. For those of you who may not remember, Martin Shkreli was an investor who became infamous for profiteering by buying the only manufacturer of the medication Daraprim and then raising the price from $13.50 per pill to $750 per pill and wound up going to jail for it. The Lown Institute’s award is given to individuals or organizations who appear to have shamelessly profiteered at the expense of our patients or our fellow healthcare professionals. I guess I just never realized how prolific ...
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Involving pharmacy students in vaccination efforts

By Magdi Awad posted 02-13-2023
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By Mohenad Rasoul, PharmD, PGY-1 Pharmacy resident, AxessPointe Community Health Centers/ Northeast Ohio Medical University, and  Magdi Awad, PharmD, MSA, Director of Pharmacy, AxessPointe Community Health Centers/Associate Professor of Pharmacy Practice, Northeast Ohio Medical University Upwards of 224 million people in the United States have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Pharmacy students, along with their respective colleges, have played a significant role in the recruitment, facilitation, and administration of COVID-19 vaccines over the past few years. These students have significantly lowered the burden on hospitals, outpatient clinics, and ...
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Straight “A’s” for Pharmacy Technicians: The Importance of Advocacy and Advancement

By Curstain Wheatley posted 02-13-2023
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Have you ever wondered how you as a pharmacy technician can get involved and make real changes to your profession? Advocacy is one of the ways you can achieve personal and professional change in pharmacy. Advocacy shows active support of an idea or cause and is usually an activity done by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions. Even if you have never thought to yourself, “How can I change the pharmacy technician world,” you have more than likely had a few thoughts surrounding these topics: the need for certified technicians; income deficits; job stability and retention; education and licensure requirements; opportunity for advancement; ...
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Details of a Remote Pharmacy Model

By Irene Chia posted 02-08-2023
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Written By: Irene Chia, PharmD – PGY1 Community-Based Pharmacy Resident Edited By: Gina Luchen, PharmD – ASHP Director of Member Relations Ever since the spread of COVID-19, many companies have adapted to virtual or remote models of work. This has impacted the type of job offers that attract more applicants – whether they are fully in-person, hybrid, or fully remote work. “Majority of workers with jobs that can be done from home are teleworking, even as more workplaces have become available” (Pew Research Center). Many may prefer remote work not only to be safe from potential infectious exposure but also due to relocation or convenience in balancing work ...
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Could we apply this tool to our informatics practice?

By Dennis Tribble posted 01-31-2023
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I happened across another interesting blog entitled “ How simulation can overcome bias and objectively test design performance ” that I urge you to read. In this blog, two architects describe how their use of a simulation modeling tool allows them to test designs for physical space against the users and workflows that need to occur within them to overcome both the biases of the designers (design preconceptions) and the biases of those for whom they are designing. One sentence from this blog particularly struck me “ It can be difficult for clinicians to understand the implications of design decisions. Their perception of space is often more shaped by a memorable ...
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Seven Healthcare IT Trends to Watch

By Dennis Tribble posted 12-31-2022
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I happened across this blog on HIT Consultant describing seven trends in healthcare IT regarding the health IT operational burden. It is worthy of a read and made me think about how those burdens are reflected in pharmacy informatics. Most significantly, the blog presented a graphic that broke down IT operational burden into five categories and assigned a portion of operational burden to each, based on the responses of CIOs to a survey: Health IT resource retention and budget– 65% - are you seeing times when IT resources you require are just not available? Management of demand and prioritization while executing multiple initiatives – 11% - are ...
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What should good manufacturing processes be for software as a medical device (SaMD)?

By Dennis Tribble posted 11-30-2022
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This may be a duplicate as I thought I had scheduled it once before, but it isn't showing up in my blog or my schedule. I had a chance to read a blog today describing how our basic concept of device good manufacturing practices needs to be enhanced to deal with the increasing presence of medical devices that consist solely of software. I must confess I was expecting this discussion to be about “loosening the controls” for software and was pleasantly surprised to see a more serious discussion about how to interpret the requirements found in ISO 13485 (the fundamental basis of cGMP for devices) for application to software systems. For those of you who aren’t ...
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ASHP PELE SAG Blog - How to Help a Pharmacy Resident Overcome Imposter Syndrome

By Deanna Fliehman posted 11-11-2022
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What is Imposter Syndrome? Impostor syndrome is a psychological pattern of successful individuals attributing their achievements to luck, rather than their own intellect, performance, and skill. 1-5 High-performing individuals feel like they are “impostors,” in their current positions and stress about being discovered as a fraud. 1,2 People who experience impostor syndrome doubt their knowledge, competence, and abilities. 1 Do pharmacy residents experience imposter syndrome? The literature has consistently shown that pharmacy students and residents experience imposter syndrome. A study by Medina et al. demonstrated that impostor syndrome was common ...
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Why AI has not transformed healthcare

By Dennis Tribble posted 10-30-2022
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I just read an interesting article in Politico entitled “ Artificial intelligence was supposed to transform health care. It hasn’t . [1] ” The article highlights the prediction that AI capabilities would render the need for human radiologists obsolete and then notes this clearly has not happened. While the article does describe some real barriers, I would like to point out some very real issues about AI in healthcare (and other high-risk endeavors) that are fundamentally different than the commercial environments in which AI is clearly flourishing. Before we dive into that, let us review some high-level thoughts on why AI may be thriving in retail: ...
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Suggesting Enhancements to Your Software Vendor

By Dennis Tribble posted 10-01-2022
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With a little over 35 years on the vendor side of the software environment, I have read quite a few customer requests for software enhancements. Indeed, one of my current roles involves reviewing enhancement suggestions for software projects. Nothing in the list that follows is intended to keep you from suggesting changes to software. Enhancement requests represent an important conversation between you and your software vendor. The way those requests are phrased, however, can play an important role in how they are received and used by the vendor. As a result, I have some suggestions that may help users be more successful in getting their enhancements considered. ...
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ASHP APPE Student Takes Policy Week

By Adriana Weiser posted 09-22-2022
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Greetings Colleagues,    As a fourth-year APPE student with ASHP, I was honored to be selected for the rotation block that extended through the annual Policy Week. For those that are not familiar with ASHP’s Policy Week, it is a time where ASHP Council and Commission members from across the country convene in Bethesda. Throughout this week, members discuss and develop policies on various topics that impact our profession, as well as participate in Legislative Day on Capitol Hill. Additionally, there are numerous attendees that observe the discussions taking place and meet with legislators as well.    This year, I was fortunate to be one of the attendees ...
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More to say on a touchy subject

By Dennis Tribble posted 09-01-2022
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I was recently recruited to write a couple of thought pieces for a new on-line publication, one of which was entitled “ 7 Mistakes Pharmacies Make with Automation ”. It is a quick read and I encourage reviewing it first as it should make reading the rest of this clearer. My insights on the topic were constrained by word-count limits and it left me with additional thoughts I wanted to share on the subject. In re-reading the article after it was published on-line, my first thought was that I had things out of order. What was listed in the article as the 7 th mistake (Lack of an overall vision for automation) should have been the first due to its importance ...
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Dashboards

By Dennis Tribble posted 08-01-2022
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I reviewed an abstract for an article in JAMIA 1 evaluating the use of dashboards as clinical decision support tools. The short story is that they generally demonstrated little or no benefit when used as standalone tools, and mixed results when they were included with other automation tools depending on the disease state. I found myself thinking about my own experience with dashboards and what makes a dashboard likely to be useful. I have seen some that seem to be quite useful, while others not so much, sometimes to my surprise. Admittedly, most of my experience has been with dashboards as operational tools rather than as clinical tools, but I suspect that ...
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All Models are wrong; some are useful

By Dennis Tribble posted 07-01-2022
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I don’t know about you, but up until I wrote the blogs on More About AI and Real World Evidence , I had never heard of George Box. The latter contains a reference to a Wikipedia article that I wound up re-reading after a colleague of mine suggested there was a lot more to think about. The phrase that caught my attention in those discussions, attributed to Box, was “All models are wrong, but some are useful”. What turns out to be important for us, I think, are some of the examples that Box and others have cited about models we tend to treat as if they were factual representations of reality. PV = RT (where P = pressure, V = volume, T = temperature ...
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The Option of Becoming a Traveling Pharmacy Technician By: Danielle Allen

By Ellen Smith posted 06-26-2022
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The Option of Becoming a Traveling Pharmacy Technician By: Danielle Allen   Opportunities to work in different pharmaceutical fields as a pharmacy technician can may seem limited. However, there are many more options, if you know where to look. One such opportunity is becoming a traveling pharmacy technician. It is common to see or hear about traveling nursing opportunities, but did you know we can travel as pharmacy technicians as well? A life on the road can initially seem appealing, but like most opportunities there are benefits and drawbacks.    To get started as a pharmacy technician you need to have at least 6 months of experience, with a majority ...
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Soft Skills and How They Can Position You for Career Advancement By: Ileen Kooyman

By Ellen Smith posted 06-17-2022
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Soft Skills and How They Can Position You for Career Advancement By: Ileen Kooyman Good technical skills are an essential aspect of growing your career as a pharmacy technician.  Technical skills are those that are developed through education or work experience.  But, are technical skills enough to position a technician to advance in pharmacy?  Developing and practicing a high level of soft skills can provide the advantage you need to advance and set yourself apart from others.  Soft skills are the personal traits that shape the way you approach work.  These would include communication skills, the ability to work as a team, and integrity.  In the fast-paced ...
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Why do we talk about preventing diversion?

By Dennis Tribble posted 06-01-2022
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Let me state up front that this is going to be a bit of a rant. I believe firmly that diversion is a problem, and that it is first and foremost a patient-safety problem. I also believe it is a problem that we can manage, but never solve, because its sources are beyond our control. First, addiction is not a matter of morals or will-power [1] . Addiction occurs because of a combination of psychological, physiological, and physical changes in the brain induced by these drugs that tends to enable and perpetuate addictive behavior. Addiction occurs as the result of a variety of factors that include environment, genetics, and development. Once it occurs, it ...
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Leadership Recommendations for New Practitioners and Pharmacists

By Carolyn O'Donnell posted 05-24-2022
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By: Carolyn O’Donnell, PharmD; Chief Pharmacy Resident & PGY-2 Psychiatric Pharmacy Resident at University at Buffalo/New York State Office of Mental Health at Buffalo Psychiatric Center As many new practitioners are starting in their pharmacy careers, leadership roles may seem far away and leadership skills may be delayed until a later point. However, whenever we are working with teams, working with colleagues, or working toward a goal, we have opportunities for leadership even if our title is not Manager, Director, or Vice President. In completing an elective residency rotation with ASHP, I witnessed a culture where leaders were true mentors, innovation ...
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Meeting the Need: Pharmacists Providing Post-COVID Clinic Care

By Alicia Sawmiller posted 05-19-2022
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The COVID-19 pandemic has left patients with ongoing symptoms from their battle with COVID. Long-hauler symptoms have challenged healthcare professionals to find ways to help patients manage their symptoms with little research. Parkview Health, serving the northeast Indiana and northwest Ohio region, responded to this need by creating the Parkview Post-COVID clinic where patients are seen by a multi-disciplinary team. The clinic team consists of neurology, pharmacy, physical medicine and rehabilitation, neuropsychology, nursing, and physical therapy. Patients are evaluated on their top five ongoing symptoms that they are the most concerned about. Some of the ...
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ASHP SAG Ambulatory Care ESC Entry- Resources for Visually Impaired Patients in the Ambulatory Care Setting

By Janee Whitner posted 04-29-2022
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Resources for Visually Impaired Patients in the Ambulatory Care Setting   Management of patients in an ambulatory setting almost always requires a level of patient self-management. The tasks that we ask of our patients can vary from monitoring blood glucose levels, to using a blood pressure cuff, or even just taking daily medications. While open communication between the patient and provider can allow these strategies to greatly improve patient outcomes, the tasks can become much more of an obstacle when considering a patient with visual impairment. This post will outline some of the currently available options and techniques that can assist patients in overcoming ...
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