Opening A New Service Marketing Channel For Medical Products: How Pharmacists Became Immunizers

Medical product firms often have limited channels of distribution due to the highly regulated environment in which they operate.  Creating a new channel for delivery of a health product is very difficult because it requires political action and requires strong arguments that there is unmet need for the product.  Determined leadership and action by the intermediaries involved and evidence that the product can be used safely in the new channel are also essential.  Pharmacists, vaccine manufacturers, and public health officials were able to open up a new channel for marketing vaccines by persistent effort over the past 15 years.  This paper describes this effort and illustrates the benefits for consumers, manufacturers, pharmacists, pharmacy chains, and the public health infrastructure.  A series of lessons learned is provided as guideposts for others to use in changing medical product distribution channels

Eelgrass Health Survey and Results

Researchers at the University of New Hampshire designed, tested, and conducted an eelgrass health survey. The primary goal of the survey was to collect health ratings from respondents who had viewed pre-selected images of eelgrass representing a wide range of health conditions. Survey results were used as a calibration and validation to a novel eelgrass health index developed using video-monitoring. Two secondary goals of this this survey were the identification of plant-specific and environmental characteristics important to respondents and the introduction of the new eelgrass health index. This published dataset includes de-identified survey respondent background and demographic data, the survey images and questions, and respondents’ eelgrass health ratings and selection rationale

A Written Instrument for Assessing Students’ Units Coordination Structures

Units coordination refers to students’ abilities to create units and maintain their relationships with other units that they contain or constitute. In recent research, units coordination has arisen as a key construct that mediates opportunities for student learning across several domains of mathematics, including fractions knowledge and algebraic reasoning. To date, assessments of students’ stages of units coordinating ability have relied upon clinical interviews or teaching experiments whose time-intensive nature precludes opportunities for conducting large-scale studies. We introduce a written instrument that teachers and researchers can use with large populations of students. We report on the reliability and validity of assessments based on the instrument

The speaking vocabulary of 454 third grade children.

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

A Comparison of Error Rates Between Intravenous Push Methods: A Prospective, Multisite, Observational Study

Objectives Current literature estimates the error rate associated with the preparation and administration of all intravenous (IV) medications to be 9.4% to 97.7% worldwide. This study aims to compare the number of observed medication preparation and administration errors between the only commercially available ready-to-administer product (Simplist) and IV push traditional practice, including a cartridge-based syringe system (Carpuject) and vials and syringes. Methods A prospective, multisite, observational study was conducted in 3 health systems in various states within the United States between December 2015 and March 2016 to observe IV push medication preparation and administration. Researchers observed a ready-to-administer product and IV push traditional practice using a validated observational method and a modified data collection sheet. All observations were reconciled to the original medication order to determine if any errors occurred. Results Researchers collected 329 observations (ready to administer = 102; traditional practice = 227) and observed 260 errors (ready to administer = 25; traditional practice = 235). The overall observed error rate for ready-to-administer products was 2.5%, and the observed error rate for IV push traditional practice was 10.4%. Conclusions The ready-to-administer group demonstrated a statistically significant lower observed error rate, suggesting that use of this product is associated with fewer observed preparation and administration errors in the clinical setting. Future studies should be completed to determine the potential for patient harm associated with these errors and improve clinical practice because it relates to the safe administration of IV push medications

How Sales Taxes Affect Customer and Firm Behavior: The Role of Search on the Internet

When a multichannel retailer opens its first retail store in a state, the firm is obligated to collect sales taxes on all Internet and catalog orders shipped to that state. This article assesses how opening a store affects Internet and catalog demand. The authors analyze purchase behavior among customers who live far from the retail store but must now pay sales taxes on catalog and Internet purchases. A comparable group of customers in a neighboring state serves as a control. The results show that Internet sales decrease significantly, but catalog sales are unaffected. Further investigation indicates that the difference in these outcomes is partly attributable to the ease with which customers can search for lower prices at competing retailers. The authors extend the analysis to a panel of multichannel firms and show that retailers that earn a large proportion of their revenue from direct channels avoid opening a first store in high-tax states. They conclude that current U.S. sales taxes laws have significant effects on both customer and firm behavior

Guidelines for Facilitating a Patient Empowerment Program

The traditional medical treatment model often ignores the emotional, spiritual, social, and cognitive aspects of living with a chronic disease such as diabetes. Empowerment programs address these psychosocial areas by helping individuals develop skills and self-awareness in goal setting, problem solving, stress management, coping, social support, and motivation. Although many diabetes educators have been taught to use an empowerment curriculum to facilitate self-management, there is minimal research concerning the actual process of providing such programs to patients. We evaluated an empowerment curriculum (Empowerment: A Personal Path to Self-Care) with a diverse group of individuals with diabetes to determine the key elements of planning and implementing a successful diabetes patient empowerment program.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68728/2/10.1177_014572179502100408.pd