Writing prescriptions quickly

A routine follow-up should take well under a minute. These are the habits that get you there.

#The screen

The prescription is on the left and the live print preview on the right. The strip under the patient's name jumps to each section: Vitals, Findings, Diagnosis, Tests, Medicines, Advice, Follow-up, and the extras for your specialty when you have them. Fill only what you need; empty sections are not printed.

To write across the whole screen, press Hide preview (the icon at the top of the preview). The form takes the full width and the preview stops redrawing while you type. Show preview at the top brings it back, and your choice is remembered on that computer.

Under Findings, the Radiology findings box below Examination takes the X-ray, ultrasound or ECG report in words (Chest X-ray PA: normal), and prints under the examination.

The patient's allergies show in red next to their name. If you type a medicine that matches a recorded allergy, a warning appears above the medicine list. It also knows common drug families by their generic names: a penicillin allergy, or an amoxicillin rash, warns for any penicillin, and an ibuprofen or NSAID allergy warns for aceclofenac or aspirin. The warning then names the family, as in Amoxycillin 500 mg (a penicillin). It is a reminder to check, not a block, and brand names are not matched to their families yet.

#Plan, and the extras for your specialty

Under Diagnosis, + Plan opens a box for what happens next (Lap. cholecystectomy under GA after pre-op work-up). It prints as Plan under the diagnosis.

Some specialties write more on every prescription. Choose yours at sign-up or in Settings → Profile → Your specialty, and the writing page offers what it uses; turn each one on or off for all your pads under Pad & printing → For your specialty:

• Plan: the Plan box open from the start (surgery, orthopaedics, obstetrics and gynaecology, ENT and others).
• Pregnancy details: the LMP, the EDD worked out from it (or a corrected EDD from a scan), the weeks of pregnancy on the visit date, and G P L A. Printed in one line with the findings.
• Eyes: vision and glasses: vision, with glasses or pinhole, near vision and IOP for each eye, and a glasses prescription with sphere, cylinder, axis and vision for distance and near, the PD and the lens. Powers are tidied as you leave a box (-1.2 becomes -1.25, 0 becomes Plano). The vision prints with the findings; the glasses prescription prints after the medicines, ruled as opticians read it.
• Diagrams to mark: body front and back, abdomen (with its nine regions), breasts and eyes. Draw with a finger, pen or mouse where the problem is or where you will operate, add a note, and it prints with the findings, your marks in red, with R and L as the patient's sides fall. Undo and Clear are beside each, and Print size picks Small, Medium or Large. Up to four on a prescription: a row holds three small, two medium or one large.
• ENT diagrams to mark: one drawing with all of it, as on an ENT pad: both eardrums (handle of the malleus, pars flaccida and cone of light), the nose with the septum and turbinates, the mouth and throat with the tonsils, the larynx as the mirror shows it, and the neck. Mark as many parts as you need on it. It prints large unless you pick a smaller size, and works with the diagrams above. On for ENT; any doctor can turn it on.
• Procedures: each procedure done at the visit, with its name (common ones such as Incision and drainage or Wound suturing are offered as you type) and a description: the anaesthesia, what was done and found, and the care after it. Add a procedure for more, up to ten. They print under the diagnosis, numbered when there are more than one. On for surgery, orthopaedics, obstetrics and gynaecology, ophthalmology, ENT, dermatology, urology and dentistry; any doctor can turn it on.

Each prints only when you fill it in, whatever the pad.

#Medicines remember themselves

The first time you prescribe a medicine, it is remembered with the dose, frequency, timing and duration you used. Next time, type two letters and pick it: the rest fills in, ready to change. The most-used appear first.

A dose you change for one patient, such as ½ tablet BD for a child when you usually give 1 tablet BD, stays on that prescription only. Your usual dose is kept for the next patient. To change the usual one, use the pencil in Library → Your medicines.

• Frequency uses the familiar 1-0-1 form (morning – afternoon – night). The usual shorthand finds it: type BD and 1-0-1 comes up, OD gives 1-0-0 or 0-1-0, ODAC gives 1-0-0, ODHS or HS gives 0-0-1, TDS gives 1-1-1 and QDS gives 1-1-1-1. Press Enter or Tab to take the one that is lit. Typing a word such as morn finds every pattern with a morning dose. SOS, Stat, alternate days, twice or thrice a week, weekly, monthly and longer gaps are in the list as well, and you can type anything else.
• ⋯ → Add instruction or route adds a line for the patient, such as Only if fever above 100°F, and the route (topical, inhalation, eye drops and so on).
• The up and down arrows in the same menu reorder medicines.

#Star the medicines you give most

Star a medicine and it is one tap away on every prescription. Under the medicines is a row of buttons, one for each starred medicine, A to Z, so each stays in the same place. Tap one and it fills the empty row, or adds a row, with your usual dose, frequency, timing, duration and any tapering dose, just as if you had typed it. A medicine already on the prescription is greyed. Up to 12 buttons show on a computer and 6 on a phone; More lists the rest with a search.

• Star them in Library → Your medicines with the star beside each medicine. Starred above the list shows only those.
• While writing, ⋯ → Star for one tap on a medicine's row stars it there and then. One you have not prescribed before goes into your medicines with that row's dose.
• Click into an empty medicine box, or press the down arrow in it, to pick from the same list with the keyboard.

Until you star one, the row shows the 12 medicines you prescribe most.

On the prescription, each medicine's first line prints in three columns: the medicine on the left, its 1-0-1 in the middle, and on the right the dose, when to take it and how long, as in 1 tablet after food × 5 days, under Dose and Duration headings on the Rx line. Its composition and your instruction print under it, across the page. A tapering or increasing dose says so under the medicine's name, with its composition and when to take it, and prints each stage as a row: then and its 1-0-1 in the middle, its strength, dose and duration on the right (10 mg · 1 tablet × 5 days).

When a prescription would run past one page, its medicines print compact by themselves, to fit it on fewer: one line for each where it fits, with the composition and your instruction beside the name, the 1-0-1 with the dose and timing (1 – 0 – 1 1 tablet · After food), and how long, on alternate light bands. A tapering dose takes one line with arrows (20 mg ×5d → 10 mg ×5d → 5 mg ×5d) and its total under Duration. Two switches under Choose your style for the medicines in the pad's settings change that for every prescription: turn on Compact medicines on every prescription to make short ones compact too, or turn off Compact when it runs past a page to keep the usual layout and let a long prescription go on to a second page. Compact medicines, above the preview and in Save, sign & print, is ticked whenever they print compact. Tick it to make one prescription compact, or clear it to keep the usual layout even if it runs to two pages. The choice is kept with that prescription only.

Choose your style for the medicines, in the pad's settings, shows each way the medicines can print as a picture: three columns or compact, and, once you turn on Medicines as a table, a table with a Qty column worked out from the dose, the 1-0-1 and the days (for tablets, capsules and the like), the same table boxed in thin lines as on a printed form, or a table with Route and Timing columns. Pick one, then change any switch under it. The route prints as you give it, or as the form goes (Oral for a tablet or syrup, Eye for eye drops, Topical for a cream); for an injection or a suppository, give it yourself.

Library → Your medicines in the sidebar lists the medicines you have prescribed or added, A to Z. Add medicines puts in ones you have not prescribed yet, with the dose, frequency, timing and duration you usually give, and a tapering or increasing dose if you use one. The pencil changes one already there. A tapering dose signed the first time you prescribe a medicine is kept too, and fills in the next time you pick it. The bin icon removes one you no longer use, and Undo brings it back. A removed medicine stops being suggested until you prescribe it again, and then comes back with the dose on that prescription. Add composition under a medicine notes what it is made of, such as Paracetamol 650 mg, or Montelukast + Levocetirizine for a combination. It shows in brackets under the name, and the search there finds it. When you prescribe that medicine, the composition prints on the line under its name, small and in brackets. A prescription keeps the compositions it was signed with. To print none, turn off Compositions in your pad's settings.

#The medicine list, diagnoses and complaints

Besides your own medicines, RxKite knows Indian brands with what they are made of. Type two letters of a brand, or of what it contains (amox clav), and after your own medicines come brands from the Medicine list, each with its composition. Pick one and its form and name fill in; the dose is yours to choose. Its composition prints under the name, unless you wrote your own in Library → Your medicines or chose Don't print composition there.

In Chief complaints and Diagnosis, the complaint or diagnosis you are typing is suggested as you go, yours first, then common ones such as Burning micturition or Enteric fever. Press the down arrow and Enter, or click one, to take it; Enter alone still starts a new line.

Library → General medicines searches the whole list, and Add puts a brand in your own medicines so you can set your usual dose for it.

#Your advice, tests, diagnoses and symptoms

Under Chief complaints, Diagnosis, the tests to do and Advice is a row of buttons: one click adds that line. They come from Library → Advice, Investigations, Diagnoses and Symptoms, which fill themselves as you sign: each line of advice, each test, each line of the diagnosis and each symptom in the complaints is kept and counted, so the ones you write most come first. A symptom is kept without its duration, so Fever × 3 days becomes + Fever, and the complaints keep however you write them, one per line or between commas. Until a list has one entry of yours, its buttons show common ones instead, to start you off. Past twelve, the rest are under More, with a search.

In the Library, Add advice (or Add tests, and so on) puts in your own, one per line. Tick Keep these lines together to put several under one button, such as the advice you give for dengue, with a short name for it: one click then adds every line. Save to Library, beside Advice and Investigations while you write, does the same with what you have written there. The pencil changes an entry, and the bin removes it, with Undo. Entries you add yourself come first. Edit list at the end of the buttons opens the list in a new tab.

#How long a prescription is valid

Under Follow-up, Prescription valid for sets how many days the pharmacy may dispense it: 1, 2, 3, 7 or 15 days, or any number you type. It prints as Valid till with the last day, just under the follow-up and highlighted so the pharmacy sees it, and goes in the email to the patient. It starts at the validity set on your pad (Pads → What to print), and None prints none on this prescription. A signed prescription keeps the validity it was signed with.

#Referred from and referred to

Under Referred from & to, after the follow-up, write who sent the patient and who you are sending them to: a doctor's name, a hospital or clinic, or both. Each prints on its own line only when you fill it in, after the follow-up unless you move it on your pad (Pad & printing → Arrange).

#Templates for common visits

For a visit you see every day, such as Viral fever — adult, write it once, then Templates → Save this visit as a template. Next time, Templates → Viral fever — adult fills in the diagnosis, medicines, tests and advice. Anything you already typed is kept; the template only adds.

Free accounts can keep three templates; paid plans keep up to 200. Manage them under Templates in the sidebar.

#Repeat a previous prescription

• On the patient's page, Repeat last starts a new visit with everything from their last signed prescription.
• While writing, the Last visit card shows their previous prescription. Add medicines adds its medicines to what you have already written, leaving out any already there; Add all also adds the diagnosis, tests and advice. Open the card to untick medicines you are stopping, or to pick one of the two visits before it.
• On any signed prescription, ⋯ → Repeat as a new visit does the same from that prescription.

#Drafts are saved as you type

Every change is saved a couple of seconds after you stop typing ("Saved" shows at the top, on a phone too). Until the server has a change, a copy is kept in this browser, so a lost connection or closed tab does not lose your work. If a save fails, RxKite tries again on its own, and Retry beside "Not saved" tries straight away. Unfinished prescriptions are listed under Prescriptions → Drafts and on the Today page.

The browser copy holds patient details, so it is removed as soon as the server has the change, after 7 days at most, and when you sign out. If you sign out with changes that never reached the server, RxKite says so first, so you can open the draft and save it. On a shared clinic computer, sign out at the end of the day.

If the same draft is open in two tabs or on two devices, a save made from an older copy is not allowed to overwrite the newer one. RxKite shows "Changed elsewhere" and lets you load the saved copy or keep yours.

#Keyboard shortcuts

On a Mac use ⌘ instead of Ctrl.

#Signing, voiding and deleting

• Save, sign & print offers Save & print, Save only and Save & WhatsApp. Each one saves and signs the prescription: it gets its number and is frozen as signed, which keeps the record trustworthy, and a front desk assistant you let print can print it.
• To change a signed prescription, open it and press Edit. The pad opens with everything written (the visit keeps its date). When you sign, you say in a few words what changed and why, and it becomes version 2 of the same number: it prints as RX-2026-00137 v2, and your front desk prints this version from then on. Version 1 is kept exactly as signed, with its PDF (under Earlier versions at the top of the prescription), and its QR code tells a pharmacist it was updated, so nobody dispenses from the old paper. Each later edit is the next version. An edit is not a new prescription, so it never counts against your plan. Until you sign it the edit is a draft, shown as Editing RX-…, and the signed version stays in force; ⋯ → Discard this edit drops it.
• A signed prescription that should not exist at all (the wrong patient, a duplicate) can be voided (⋯ → Void…) with a reason. It stays in the record marked void, and its verification QR then shows void to anyone who scans it.
• To correct it, leave Copy it into a new draft chosen when you void it: a new draft opens with everything you wrote, on the same visit date, to change what was wrong and sign again. Written for the wrong patient? Choose Copy it for another patient and find the right one. A prescription voided earlier has Copy to a new draft and For another patient… at its top. The corrected one is a new prescription with its own number, and counts like any other.
• An unsigned draft can simply be deleted (⋯ → Delete draft).