One View of the Future of ‘Flowcasting’

Penelope Ody who writes for the Supply Chain Standard has written an interesting item about ‘flowcasting.’ Entitled, Sharing the crystal ball, it is about the growing need to minimize out of stock incidents and

Is it just me, or are barcodes gaining stature?

For a long time it has been my impression that barcodes are invisible to most people. And why not? If all they do is validate a price quickly and debit the inventory count on hand, what’s the big deal? But in the past several months it seems barcodes are

FDA Public Meetings on Produce Traceability Set for Oct. 16

If you take a look at this news bulletin from this week, you’ll see the FDA is moving ahead on two fronts: 1.) It is getting serious about produce traceability solutions and standards; and, 2.) they are backing GS1 as the produce traceability standard. Now what are the chances the FDA would select

AHRMM GS1 Compliance Survey Results Are In! (It’s Not Pretty.)

You remember the July AHRMM Annual Conference in Texas where GS1 had a major presence? That’s where we officially announced this blog, also. Well, GS1 conducted a survey of healthcare providers, vendors and suppliers to determine their readiness for GS1 barcodes and GS1 compliance.

GS1 Hungary: “Getting Supply Chain Improvement on the Executive Agenda”

The headline on this post comes from a planned roundtable discussion to take place

Supermarket News Weighs in on GS1, GTINs

“…a formidable weapon in the food safety battle.” That’s a quote from David Orgel, Editor-in-Chief of Supermarket News. What is he talking about?

Trust, but Verify! GS1 US Will Vet Your GS1 Barcodes & GS1 Compliance

There’s a tendency among some to characterize this whole GS1 standards process as a snap. Well, it’s not a difficult concept. But en route to the perfect GS1 compliant bar code, stuff happens sometimes. A favorite quote of mine — that has been attributed to everyone from Lawrence Peter Berra (aka Yogi Berra) to Jan L. [...]

Tainted Products: “It’s going to get worse before it gets better…”

My Loftware associate Christopher Piela, who is our Healthcare Vertical Specialist, just brought two very important,

Opening a Blog Post Puts It Below Left Hand Side Navigation

We don’t know what’s wrong with WordPress but if you’re running Firefox, Chrome or the latest IE beta, when you open a blog post, the display messes-up and puts the text halfway down the window (below the left hand column).

Oracle OpenWorld 08

This doesn’t really have much to do with GS1 in healthcare except

No Blackouts in Future of Product Movement

One of the reasons why I would never be an astronaut, aside from not being smart enough, is because that re-entry blackout period of

A Blow to GS1 Standards Adoption? California USA Considers Delays In e-pedigree Law until 2016?!?

A month ago, California moved to put their e-pedigree bill on a different adoption timetable than originally slated. It’s important to know about because California isn’t just another state in

The Mysterious License Plate/Barcode on Steve Jobs’ Benz?

I’ve been trying to ignore this story circulating in the blogosphere for a week now, but its value as a brief diversion from

Need a ‘dirty data team’?

Thanks to a Google glitch, a previously published Computerworld story about the horrors of global data synchronization showed

FDA COOL Law vs. GS1 Barcodes and GS1 Labels?

Sterling noticed this “news” item on the fast up-coming start date of the extension of the FDA Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) law. It’s in force the end of the month. That’s this month. Curiously, it appears the FDA

GHX to Become GDSN-Certified Data Pool

Here’s another sign of the inevitable: GHX, LLC has announced plans to become part of GS1’s Global Data Synchronization Network (GDSN) as a GDSN-certified data pool for the healthcare industry.

GS1 Australia Going Beyond Standard GS1 Barcode Data

There’s a story today from Australia that is ostensibly about a barcode scanner that talks. That’s interesting — and useful as they point out for the visually impaired — but there’s a comment in the piece which may carry implications for all of us, whether visually impaired or not. Here’s the comment:

Tennessee Town to Try ‘Trashy’ Barcodes

Here’s this week’s tribute to the offbeat from the world of barcodes: a town in Tennessee is applying bar codes to recycling bins so that

Surgical Care Expert Advocates for GS1 Compliance Labels

Mary Ann Michalski is a National Account Manager with an organization called Surgical Care Affiliates in Birmingham, Alabama. In July, an insightful article she wrote appeared in Materials Management in Healthcare. Entitled, ‘Why standards should be everyone’s priority,’  

Big News Redux: Do License Plates Matter? (Or: Why HL7 and GS1 Is BIG News)

I’m going to be persistent on this press release by HL7 and GS1. Here’s a redux of the “big news” post I did that went over like one of those cheap balloons you grab at the checkout counter at the grocery store for your youngest and it’s dead on the living room floor that afternoon.