Our patients

This was an email I sent to our team at Pharmacy OneSource. When we work in healthcare (vendor or provider) we make a difference in patient's lives. Every email, every phone call makes a difference.

Hello everyone-

I just finished up a presentation with a group of 30 hospitals. I was demonstrating Accupedia to them. In the PowerPoint, I included an image of a patient in the Pediatric ICU at a hospital. It will be somewhat shocking for those of you who have not been in a hospital before or have limited exposure to patient care.


This patient is very sick. They are ventilated (breathing machine) with at least 5 infusions, some medication-laced. They are fully monitored. They invariably have an indwelling urinary catheter, probably 2-3 IV lines in, at least one directly into the heart. There is a tube into the patient’s stomach to drain away the acid. The bed is a large oscillating balloon designed to prevent pressure ulcers. The noise and chaos this represents is what our customers deal with on a day-in and day-out basis. Not to mention the impact on the patient. And the family.

The reason I share this is that it is easy to forget what the impact of our efforts TRULY mean sometimes. Let me draw the lines:

• We help someone setup Simplifi797 so they can more efficiently document and manage their IV Clean Room. The efficiency gained by using Simplfi797 ensures that all the proper cleaning solutions are used to keep the prep areas sterile. The IV bag you see hanging in the picture was made in a pharmacy clean room. If it contained ANY bacterial contamination at all, this patient would probably die.

• We write a line of code for Sentri7 that makes it easier for a pharmacist to monitor for a drug this patient is taking that can lead to kidney failure in patients who have poor kidney function. This patient’s kidneys are only running a quarter as good as normal. The pharmacist detects this issue in Sentri7 and makes a dose adjustment that spares this patient from going on a dialysis machine.

• We help someone with a question about Unit Stock trend reporting. Because of the better understanding of how to run a trend report, a pharmacy manager notices that this ICU has had problems with outdated medications in their floor supply. A pharmacy technician was dispatched, did a unit inspection on this floor and pulled a set of outdated atropine vials 2 days ago. This patient just got a dose of atropine 15 minutes ago… that was fresh and not expired. The expired med might not have worked properly and the patient dies.

We all do VERY important things here. Things we should all be proud of. I know I am.


~charles