Episode #1: An Inside Look at Scrub Pocket

Timestamps:

[0:00] Introduction and Jingle

[0:21] Intro to Scrub Pocket and Ben Loveland’s Role

[1:20] Transitioning from the Medical Field to Business

[2:31] Scrub Pocket Merchandise

[4:41] Impact of COVID-19 on Scrub Pocket

[6:47] What does the future look like for Scrub Pocket?

[8:57] Scrub Pocket’s Website Information

[9:07] AC STEM Network Jingle

Credits:

Publisher: Amherst STEM Network

Podcasts Coordinator: Julia Zabinska

Music Composer: Grace Geeganage

Cover Art Designer: Chloe Kim

Image courtesy of Scrub Pocket

Transcript:

[0:00] Introduction and Jingle 

I’m Julia Zabinska from the Amherst STEM Network. This is STEMherst.

AC STEM Network Jingle

[0:21] Intro to Scrub Pocket and Ben Loveland’s Role

Welcome, everyone, to Amherst STEM Network’s first go at a podcast interview! Today I will be interviewing Ben Loveland, my internship supervisor at Scrub Pocket with whom I’ve been working for about three weeks now. Ben, thank you so much for joining us today! Would you mind telling us a bit about Scrub Pocket as a company and what your role specifically is within the day-to-day operations of Scrub Pocket?

Yeah, sure. So Scrub Pocket is a company that I started, and it is focused on making, sort of, customized references for nurses, doctors, and other healthcare professionals. I own the company, and it’s a small business, so I’m certainly, I have many hats here in marketing and payroll and human resources, and everything. Including designing the cards and the content and everything that we put out. 

[1:20] Transitioning from the Medical Field to Business

All right, thank you, so, um, now that the audience knows a bit about Scrub Pocket and what it is we do everyday, I was hoping you could touch a bit upon what it was like to transition from your previous occupation as an EMT nurse to the business world. And, more generally, how have your previous experiences in the medical profession shaped your approach and values that you bring to this company?

Uh, yeah, that’s a great question! Uh, so I started—it was, it was kind of a slow transition. It wasn’t an overnight thing. I say this a lot, I always felt that the business was going to be kind of a side business. I didn’t ever think it would ever turn into my career, which it has, which is great! It’s been a lot of fun. But, uh, so that slow transition was nice, that it wasn’t an overnight thing, so it allowed me to still work clinically and do the business, and then as the business grew, and as I got more confident in the business, I was able to totally transition over.  

[2:31] Scrub Pocket Merchandise

While I’m sure that the transition may have had its many challenges, it’s certainly difficult to tell today, as the company is so well-established in many different hospitals and providers across the country! Uh, could you talk a little bit about which products you’ve found to be the most popular among medical providers and why you think that to be the case?

Sure! So probably one of our, one of the first popular cards, and still is very popular today that resonated really well with people, was our lab value badge card. And that’s something that a lot of different providers need to know, to know those values, and I think that the thing that it made me realize (and this was true of me as well), that when you’re in the learning phase, when you’re in the student mindset and still kind of getting to know all the knowledge, that’s when these can be really useful because not all that information is totally engrained, so it’s nice to have that little cheat sheet that you can reference when needed. The majority of ours are on an ID size so that they can be clipped right with your ID, and it makes it really handy to just quickly reference it if you need to. The other kind of card that’s done well is the high-risk, low-volume, so things that you don’t encounter a lot, and that it’s tough to devote that information to memory. But it’s maybe a little tricker information, or something that you really want to get right, so it’s nice to have a little cheatsheet with that. The card that comes to mind with that one is burn calculations, so that one would be a good example of, you know, even if you’re in the emergency department, you maybe don’t see burns everyday, so to calculate the burn percentage, there’s a formula, there’s a tried-and-true calculation for that, and we’ve got a card that helps with that.  

[4:41] Impact of COVID-19 on Scrub Pocket

To follow up on that previous question, obviously, the medical field finds itself in an unparalleled and quite unstable position during this time of COVID-19. I’m sure that providers are turning to companies like Scrub Pocket for reference materials or supplies to help them carry out their work more efficiently and effectively. I was wondering whether you’ve noticed certain products that have been selling more during this time than others, potentially due to the virus?

Um, yeah, so, when COVID hit, we actually saw sales go down a bit, I think because everyone was just kind of, particularly when all the lockdowns happened, and we were kind of regrouping ourselves as a company. One of the things that came to mind was What can we do? What can we do to help the situation? There was a lot of talk, obviously, about ventilators and are there going to be enough ventilators? My thought process went to, “Even if we figure out this ventilator part, someone’s got to run the ventilators,” and there’s not going to be enough respiratory techs out there. What’s going to end up happening is you’re going to see other personnel, nurses, doctors, that are going to get cross-trained to help manage the vents. So I thought it’d be useful to have a reference card for ventilator management. We made a couple of those; we actually ended up just giving them out for free because it was like, “Hey, let’s see if we can do our part”! And we gave them out to anybody who needed them; they could get them right from our website for free. And we’ve continued that! We’ve given out at least 3,000, and it could be a little north of that anyways, so that’s done well, and we feel like we’ve been able to kind of do our part in everything that’s been going on.    

[6:47] What does the future look like for Scrub Pocket?

 Uh, it’s really great to hear how Scrub Pocket has been adjusting with the times, and Ben, I really appreciate the insight that you’ve shared with us about Scrub Pocket’s products and I just wanted to leave our listeners and readers with one last thought. Um, what directions do you see Scrub Pocket taking in the future as the company develops? And are there any product ideas that you’re excited about or specializations within the medical field that you hope to cater to?

Yeah, I mean, we are going to keep expanding on our card product/catalogue. That’s something that we’re excited to keep growing, including some of the work that you’ve done with us, which has been exciting! There’ll be more to come on that. We’ve also had a lot of successful collaborations with other companies and some licensing opportunities that we’ve been able to do. We did one with the Wong-Baker foundation. They’re the ones that make that classic pain-rating scale that has those smiley faces and the sad faces, which has been around since the 80s. It’s been a great tool for, particularly amongst the pediatric population, for them to be able to describe their pain so we’ve done a great collaboration with them. And then the ESI, which is the triaging protocol that the majority of hospitals in the United States use. We’ve done a collaboration with them so that’s another thing that we’re looking to continue to do. We’ve had a lot of successful ones in the past and we want to kind of keep doing those. More to come on that!

Awesome! Well, Ben, it’s been a pleasure talking with you today and more generally working with you and the whole Scrub Pocket team. I’d like to thank you for taking the time to answer my questions and wish you and the company all the best in the future!

 Yeah, thank you so much! Thanks for being here this summer and thanks for chatting with us. 

[8:57] Scrub Pocket’s Website Information

 To our listeners and readers, if you would like to check out Scrub Pocket’s products, head over to https://www.scrubpocket.com. Thank you for listening and reading!

[9:07] AC STEM Network Jingle