Home Forums Discussions Problems Updating Medication list in Version 5 Beta

I wonder anyone has the same problem we encountered after updating to the ACV5 beta. All the medications including those we click in (not free text) using V4 are now in Italic form. All these meds in Italic form are not reconized for drug interaction or allergy check. It is a lot of work to reenter each medication in each patient. It is painful to delete or inactivate the each medication in Italic form. We have to do it one by one and type in the reason why we delete each medication. Is there any better way to update the medication list in V5 Beta?

Open a chart - go to scrip writer.
Highlight the med - then hit the right mouse button and CODIFY.
This brings up a list of possible subs - eg....
Ventolin --- Ventolin HFA, etc.
This will not always be accurate as some are spelled wrong, put in wrong format, etc.
Highlight the one you want and then hit codify for all pts.
If you have been consistent and always typed amoxicillin 500 mg for example it will change all pt. with this entered to AMOXICILLIN 500 that you pick out of the codified list.

It really takes only a minute or two per pt. to do this and after you do it for a while you will find many pt. have already had them codified.

ONE CAVEAT - if you choose one wrong on accident and then hit for all patients then all will be wrong. In a very early beta this was a problem, but now should not be easy to do. Make sure you choose the right med and if you want to get used to it just do it for the current pt. only until you feel comfortable.

I have been using beta for a long time and many of my patients are already codified. Really only takes me a few seconds and I can do while reviewing meds with patient (something we should do more often anyway) - I bring up the med list, right click it and ask the pt or look at their bottles/list to verify and then codify....move onto next med.

I also verify allergies - most are entered as free text until you codify them. I just use that to read each old one - type it into search and then hit add....delete/inactivate the italicized ones after I do that and then confirm allergies. It then marks in the chart that you updated which adds to the medical complexity for that date of service for coding purposes (and shows you put effort into verifying).

Thanks Steven, I did not know that was possible.

On Version 5 I am discouraged to see that when you are working on a patient's note and double click on the medication section to open it up, certain useful features seem to have vanished unless I am missing something:
1. I open up the med list. I want to add a new med. I can't. I now have to go to another page?? I have to go to the prescribing page?
2. The drop down list has disappeared for dosing regimens on this page. What a waste of time to have to type in the dosing schedule manually for each med.
3. There seems to be a major problem with having med names in different fonts appearing on the med list. This looks really unprofessional. Can this be fixed? Our notes go out to referring physicians and need to look professional. Having different font types is annoying and amateurish. To have to manually change the fonts adds time.
4. When I do go to the prescibing page, on the drop down list for med dosing there is nothing for BID dosing.
5. We see patients that are referred. The med list is crucial. The meds often change between when we last saw the patient and the current visit. I used to be able to open the patient's last visit note, then open the med list, then make the changes. Now all of that seems to be a very complicated process. Can we go back to the old system?
Any suggestions welcome.

The area where you doubleclick on the med list was changed so that changes you make do not show up in YOUR chart as a PRESCRIPTION you wrote, instead allowing you to add data about what it was for and who wrote it.

1) You should be able to go on the right side after double clicking and add any med you desire.
2) the drop down list is gone here - it is no longer being put in as a scrip
3) The upperCASE and LOWERcase thing you are noticing is a scrip called TALLMAN and was implemented in scrips to make people forced to visualize meds and hopefully prevent misreading them (I know it looks dumb) and AC says they cannot get rid of it. The lead programmer was looking at a way to make it better in the chart note (even all caps would look better), but scrips have to stay that way.
4) The drop down list for dosing that shows up in scrips is populated from your prescribing habits. I don't believe that any are drop down anymore and after you code the medicine then you enter the way you normally write it, the next time you pick same med it brings up that one.
5) I use this all the time and it works okay once you get the hang of it. You can always enter as a scrip, but then it appears you are writing scrips - I occasionally do it, but leave qty blank so I know that I did not write scrip, but just added med.

Thanks very much for your help.
I must say that these changes don't make a lot of sense to me.
In the older version, you would simply open up the current med list while working on a currnet visit, and then add/delete/change meds and doses. Now this seems incredibly more complicated to do. I would really like to see the drop down list of dosing put back on when you open up the current med list and have a patient's current visit in front of you. Doesn't this intuitively make sense?

This thread needs to be updated to reflect version 5 and this information regarding right clicking and codifying should be better documented.

This is a great program, but finding and/or learning all of the features should not be so difficult.

I had been rewriting prescriptions for patients to codify and then having to go back and delete the old prescription, very slow and irritating. this method is great, but not documented!

Greg

Hi Greg

Tech support is in the process of creating instructions to cover all aspects of AC. At this time we have instructions (which include screenshots) on how to use the new features in v5; this includes Meds, Orders, HM along with a few others (how to update, etc.). We hope to have this available on our website soon, in the meantime; you can request the instructions by emailing tech support at techsupport@amazingcharts.com or pinging us by going to www.amazingcharts.com/help

Trish

ABSOLUTELY! WE have went ahead and started correcting ALL of our pt's. Yeah, ALL 2500 OF THEM! NICE!

It's funny but I said the same thing that the upper and lower case med names do look REALLY dumb. It looks like you are a lazy typist or stupid or something. Oh well.

Great news. I will try to mass correct meds but I have a feeling it will create even more problems.

I agree with everything this doc is saying. V5 seems to be even more tedious than V4 and the upper/lower case meds and brand name meds are capitalized while generics are not DOES MAKE IT LOOK VERY UNPROFESSIONAL!!! I'M sure EVERYONE wants AC to be FASTER to use, NOT slower AND TO LOOK MORE PROFESSIONAL!!! It could be a great program but there are not enough intuitive buttons or user friendly screens to it YET!

I'll look into this issue - one thing to note is that drug/drug and drug/allergy interaction checking does take some time, especially for patients on a number of meds or with a number of allergies.

You can turn off the automatic checking that occurs each time the med window is opened under the settings menu in the medication window. This won't stop the checking when adding a med, but may improve your speed issue.