Guide to setting up automatic dosage
Guide to setting up system so as to display suggested drug doses with regard to the weight of the animal and the species.
- Select Stock control - Parameters - Lookup tables - Warnings.
- Enter the dose instructions using the edit command and choosing the next available number.
- At details, enter the instructions that you use e.g
Use every day for && days, && grams && times a day for && day[s]
etc,
exactly as you would have entered them in General applications - Parameters - Lookup tables - Doses.
It is necessary to enter the details here even if you already have them set up under doses.
Continue until all instructions that you need are entered. - Select List then Printer to print the list of warnings because you will
need to refer to this later.
The maximum number of entries here is 98 so you are far less restricted than if you use the dose set-up in General applications - Parameters - Lookup tables - Doses. - Choose the drug that you want to display the suggested dose calculation
e.g Synulox 50mg tablets by selecting Stock Control - Access item.- Press the down arrow key to display the second screen.
- Select e for edit and press return until the Warning section is highlighted. type the number of the dose instruction required with reference to the list printed earlier at section 1.
- Dose instructions will be displayed in warning field. If OK press return to accept.
- Press return until dosage field is highlighted and enter as follows
e.g*ca = 4 tabs fe = 2 tabs.
The field must begin with an * as this is the instruction to calculate the dose.
The above example denoted the dose as 4 tabs per kg for canines and 2 tabs per kg for felines. - Use the first two letters of the species e.g
ca=canine, fe=feline etc and ENSURE that two spaces are left between each instruction. - The dose is calculated per kg of animal weight so all dose instructions entered have to be relevant to per kg. this field will accept fractions of a tablet, mg etc, e.g .333. Do not enter the 0 before the decimal point.
- If you do not enter a species as part of the dose instruction e.g *.333mgs the suggested dose will still be displayed but will apply whenever the drug is used regardless of the species entered on the animal record.
- If a species is part of the dose instruction only information relevant to the species which matches that of the animal record will be displayed when the drug is selected.
- The dosage field will also allow you to enter restricted text as part of the instruction e,g BID,UID, OID etc but no other text. Example, *.5 mg BID.
SUGGESTION. The length of the dosage field is quite restrictive so that with a drug such as Baytril which has a number of different doses/species we have had to adapt slightly and so have created a separate stock item per species e.g Baytril 15mg tabs - cn/fl and Baytril 15mg tabs - hams with the relevant suggested doses for canine/feline and hamsters entered under each stock item.
SUGGESTION. If you have not already done so consider adding the data sheet to your stock items as you set up the dosages.
- Select a client record, Clin - Auto and using the / and part of the drug name
select your drug e.g /bayt for baytril.
The suggested dose based on the animals weight and the species, as per the
computer record, will be displayed in the information box together with the
suggested dose per kg in brackets.
If you have entered the data sheet, as suggested then selecting D at this point will allow you to check the data sheet should you wish to.
The dosage is displayed as a total amount in the relevant unit e.g 20mgs without reference to the size of the tablet etc that you may have selected. Therefore if the suggested dose displayed is 20mg and the strength of tablet selected is 5mg then 4 tablets are suggested.(Is that a bit too obvious?).
A handy tip, at this point, is to use the calculator function by pressing F8 and entering your calculation e.g 300/50 for a suggested dose of 300mg dispensed as 50mg tablets gives an answer of 6 tablets.
No suggestion is made as to the length of the treatment although the suggested daily treatment can be displayed e.g BID, as explained earlier.
The rest of the procedure for dispensing the drug to the client is as normal.
NOTE: If the species on the animal record does not match any species in the instruction then no dose will be suggested and "no details for canine" etc will be displayed.
NOTE: If the weight does not appear on the animal record the dose per kg still appears but there is no suggested dose.