Home Forums Discussions Feedback and Recommendations Suffixes on Prescriptions

I just had an Optum Mail Order pharmacist ask if I could make sure that the patient's suffix (in this case, "Jr.") could be on the E-script. I had never noticed if it printed it or not, but this was on a patient with a very common name (and apparently a very common birthday, haha), and the pharmacist was having trouble making sure that we were discussing the right patient. Apparently there were more than one registration for this patient, with different addresses, adding to the confusion. What do you guys think? Should the Rx have the suffix on it, or could this cause more problems....

This is one of the really big issues of our time, not, but since it came up I thought I'd throw it out there.

Very strange. In the demographics, the part of the name which appears to show up are in red above it and bold black in the actual field. The middle initial and suffix are in a light font. If you add the suffix there, the name will appear in various places in the chart such as the MRE was John Smith, Jr. but the middle initial (I would contend more important than the suffix for ID) doesn't. Only the first and last name show up on the scripts.

Ironically, when I view certain documents pertaining to the patient in other areas, the middle initial shows up.

I have never run into that situation, because generally even if I have a patient with a very common first and last name and the most common birthday of September 9th, it is enough to identify them.