I’ve Been Thinking about connecting dots.

This I’ve been thinking was written on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of GS1 Healthcare and was published in the Autumn 2010 edition of GS1 Healthcare News.

I’ve been thinking about connecting dots.

The year I was born, Warner Brothers released the first color newsreel, Britain established the National Health Service, the fasting Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated, Babe Ruth died, Apple’s Steve Jobs was still seven years away, oh yeah, and the bar code was invented.

It was 1948 when a local grocery chain approached Drexel Institute about developing a method for automatically reading product information during checkout. Bernard Silver joined fellow graduate student Joseph Woodland in working on a solution. They came up with a machine-readable code (called a “bull’s eye”), comprised of a series of concentric circles. These codes were printed on labels that had to be placed on items by hand (not printed on product packaging as they are today).

While the bar code made its commercial debut in 1966, the year I graduated from high school, it took several years for grocers to discern that a better symbol was required and that an industry standard would be essential for widespread adoption. In 1971, IBM engineer George Laurer was assigned the task of developing a bar code suitable for the industry. In 1972, his invention was adopted by the Uniform Grocery Product Code Council (a not-for-profit corporation formed by the grocery industry’s leading trade associations). His symbol, still with us today, was eventually named the Universal Product Code (UPC), hinting that the council anticipated applications beyond groceries in the years ahead.

The first scanning system was installed at Marsh’s Supermarket in Troy, Ohio, and on June 29, 1974, the first product (a 10-pack of Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit chewing gum) was scanned.

Early bar code adoption was not impressive. A 1976 Business Week article, entitled “The Supermarket Scanner That Failed,” noted that while experts had predicted 1,000 stores would have scanners by that point, only 50 were up and running. Hang in there. By 1985, virtually every product in drug and grocery stores across America had a bar code. By 1990, virtually every product in retail had a bar code – mouthwash at Walgreens and deep-friend bananas at Kroger as well as duct tape at Home Depot and stilettos at Nordstrom. However, it wasn’t until 1991 that the first unit-dose drug package in the United States included a bar code. By 2000, only 30 percent of unit doses had bar codes. Hang in there. In 2004, the FDA issued a regulation requiring that drug manufacturers include linear bar codes on all immediate drug packages (effective April 2006).

Looking back, this was a tipping point for hospitals implementing medication-administration bar coding at the point of care (BPOC) – a cause to which I and many of you are unabashedly devoted.

No one played a more catalytic role in prompting the FDA to this action than GS1 US, which traces its roots back through the Uniform Code Council to the Uniform Grocery Product Code Council.

Thank God, BPOC is no longer a voice crying in the wilderness. Not only is the movement sweeping across America (having exceeded 30 percent adoption), but it is also spreading around the globe, thanks largely to the tireless efforts of GS1 Healthcare’s first five years. For example, last month the European Association of Hospital Pharmacists (EAHP) and GS1 announced that they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to collaborate in promoting patient safety with bar coding. In Britain, the National Patient Safety Agency’s Guidance on the Standard for Patient Identifiers for Identity Bands leaned heavily on the expertise of GS1 UK, whose leadership is influencing the spread of bar coding throughout the 62-year old NHS.
Recently, I looked up and reached out to bar code fathers Joseph Woodland and George Laurer. Sadly, I was not able to connect with Mr. Woodland, who is reportedly suffering from Alzheimer’s. Happily, Mr. Laurer accepted my invitation to lunch. I wanted to know if he had any idea back in the day how his invention would impact patient safety today. No, he hadn’t. More importantly, I wanted to thank these two gentlemen for their work, which paved the way to a safer point of care for patients everywhere.

While Babe Ruth’s accomplishments have been captured on miles of film, Warner Brothers probably won’t be making a movie about the men behind the bar code. Take nothing away from the Great Bambino, but it seems to me that greater contributions are made behind the scenes in the quiet of a lab or a garage than out in front of the cameras or down below the roar of the crowd. Mr. Woodland might be forgetful these days, but his good work should not be forgotten.

And so the torch passes from one generation to the next. As we are taking our turn, a line from Steve Jobs’ commencement address to Stanford’s class of 2005 resonates with me: “You can’t connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards.”

When progress seems to move at the speed of dark and our best efforts fail to produce their desired results, it’s good to remember that a day will come when those who look back on our work will connect the dots. We’re accomplishing more than we presently perceive.

Not to suggest that everyone gets it. We have the naysayers and a handful who take their shots. That’s the time to draw inspiration from Gandhi who fought on without fighting back. While I could afford to downsize, I’m not so sure I’d be willing to fast like the guru until we’re bar coding at all points of care. Nevertheless, I pray to keep the hang-in-there required for getting to that next dot.

Meanwhile, congratulations to GS1 Healthcare for five years of connecting the dots. Stay the course.

What do you think?

Mark Neuenschwander a.k.a. Noosh

mark@hospitalrx.com
http://twitter.com/hospitalrx

Copyright 2010 The Neuenschwander Company