The Barcode Guy was created to be able to give description, definition, and hopefully a little clarity to the barcode world. This world includes barcode scanners, barcode printers, barcode software, and everything associated. Funded by A1 Barcode Systems.
Raspberry Pi and Visual Basic Book
Programming Windows 10 IoT
This book has many examples using the Raspberry Pi and Windows 10 IoT. The best things is they are all in an easy to understand programming language from Visual Studio Community 2017. Even better it is a free Integrated Enviornment!
This is the paperback review and purchase area on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0692071881/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520546916&sr=8-1&keywords=visual+basic+raspberry+pi
Kindle Review and Purchase area
https://www.amazon.com/Raspberry-Pi-Visual-Basic-Programming-ebook/dp/B07B5W3P8V/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520546916&sr=8-2&keywords=visual+basic+raspberry+pi
There's plenty of case information proving that barcode wristbands best practices can help improve patient safety, boost quality of care, and achieve industry mandates. But, not all wristband deployments take advantage of the full value bar coding can deliver. Realizing the most benefit requires that the information provided on the wristband must afford easy readability, and deliver the correct information.
If you are looking at various patient ID solutions, you must take into account formatting considerations to ensure you make the optimal choice. This is especially crucial during the first 30 days of looking at a patient ID solution.
Bar Code Wristbands Help Drive Accuracy and Patient Safety
Bar code-based systems present a wide range of benefits to the healthcare industry. Caregivers can quickly identify patients and document associated treatments while enhancing the use of electronic health records (EHRs) to improve accuracy and completeness. Digitizing the entire point of care workflow helps ensure that clinicians have access to the information they need to deliver the safest, most effective care.
Bar code wristbands can improve the effectiveness of "Five Rights"—Right Patient, Right Medication, Right Dose, Right Time, and Right Method of Administration" checks. Doing so is essential for error-free medication administration and provides a platform to extend safeguards to other patient care activities.
Best Practices Help Drive Superior Results
Be sure implement best practices as soon as you choose the bar code wristbands, software applications, scanners, and other supporting infrastructure. By making best practices a core part of your workflow, you can certify that the correct processes become part of daily use. Ensuring patient safety requires that the patient continuously wears the wristband and that it remains readable for the duration of their hospital stay. The wristband must also uniquely identify the patient in a HIPAA-compliant manner.
Keep in mind that the process for designing, formatting, and producing bar code wristbands is not much different from traditional wristbands. To gain the most value, medical centers must ensure that wristbands contain the right information, meet industry mandates, and provide staff with an efficient solution. Following the best practices below will help you realize the full benefits that properly designed bar code wristbands can deliver:
Best Practice 1 – Repeat 2-D Bar Codes Across the Wristband
Best Practice 2 – Use Two Linear Bar Codes
Best Practice 3 – Include Human-readable Text
Best Practice 4 – Include the medical record number (MRN) and financial institution number (FIN)
Best Practice 5 – Include Check-digits for Security
Best Practice 6 – Include Print Time and Other Traceability Text
Best Practice 7 – Use Thermal Print-on-Demand Printers
Not only do barcode wristband best practices improve accuracy and patient safety. Following best practices also helps eliminate workarounds that often burden medical staff and create more steps to providing care, like having to move a patient's arm to scan an improperly formatted wristband.
Zebra Healthcare
Reproduced by Permission of Zebra Technologies
Article originally by Sabine Nickel
What happens when a lab specimen label contains incorrect information? According to the study by the College of American Pathologists, over 160,000 adverse events in U.S. hospitals occur annually because of sample identification errors. When it comes to the health of our loved ones and us, such numbers are concerning.
Beyond the human toll, sample misidentification creates financial waste, with redraws, retesting and additional treatment costing the healthcare industry an estimated $200-$400 million per year. In this era of rising healthcare costs, every dollar has an impact on us all. Based on these numbers alone, it is clear that accurate sample labeling is vital to improve both the quality and cost of healthcare.
Accurate Labeling as Preventive Medicine
Healthcare providers have been aware of the impact of sample misidentification for decades, and continuously look for ways to improve their lab processes. Accurate sample labeling is the best defense against misidentification errors and their consequences. Labeling samples at the time they are drawn is a proven method to reduce errors.
However, to achieve accuracy, healthcare providers must overcome several challenges:
■Increasing information – A standardization of electronic healthcare records means the gathering, storing, and linking of more information throughout the patient care process. In addition, blood, tissue, and cellular therapy products must be compliant with the ISBT 128 identification standard of labeling—a process simply not attainable with manual labeling.
■Label sizing – A label provides the critical link between the physical specimen and all the information in the systems associated with it. Test tubes, slides, hermetically sealed containers all require specific label dimensions. Cost-effective label creation means using versatile printing technology that produces a label in the exact size for the task, and only when it is needed.
■Durability – Pathology labs often must store specimens for up to 20 years, which means labels must be durable enough to last and afford resistance to chemicals. In areas such as blood banking and cellular therapies, products undergo cryopreservation, then stored for an extended period before patient transplantation.
■Legibility – Medical centers have found that color-coded labels provide a visual indicator of what tests the lab must perform, saving time. Furthermore, because each sample and patient are unique, healthcare providers need a labeling solution that replaces preprinted labels with a system that create labels on demand, and that will not smudge when exposed to liquids.
The Prescription – Bar Code Labeling
Bar code labeling and sample tracking provides medical centers a proven way to reduce sample identification and data entry errors. What’s more, using bar codes to identify samples and scanning them to record transfers and support test result entry extends accuracy and error prevention benefits into laboratory operations. Automated data entry is highly accurate and eliminates errors, which improves patient safety. Bar code sample identification also saves time, allowing lab staff to focus on clinical rather than clerical activities—thus improving both the quality and cost of healthcare.
For more information about bar code labeling technologies in laboratories, see Lab Labeling Solutions.
