Copyright: Visual Help ® 1993-1994 Firas Bushnaq


Topic1
FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL

UNREGISTERED VERSION HELP FILE

Thank you for using the FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL. By using this program you are taking charge of your medical history and recordkeeping. In the old days, all our medical records were at the office of good old Doctor Jones on Main Street. Things are different now. We may go to several doctors specializing in various fields. Family members have different doctors. Plus doctors and families move away to distant places and who knows where our "records" are then ?  When someone changes jobs or buys life insurance, there are a lot of medical questions asked but our memories are not perfect and we often don't have a means of accurately keeping up with what has happened - immunizations, xrays, etc. Trying to piece together this information is time-consuming, aggravating and may be hazardous to your health!

FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL is an effective way to keep track of all these medical "events" in your life and in the lives of all your family members. FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL can keep track of all sorts of medical information which you can retrieve and print almost instantly for any family member. This not only saves a lot of time, it may be important to your well-being. Physicians and other healthcare providers require accurate information to provide the best possible medical care. FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL maintains that information so that it is readily available.

FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL is very easy to use and adapts to the way you want to keep your records. The main organizing tool is a TAB control. Each tab accesses a different area of the program. To select one of the tabs, simply click on the tab that you want to access.  Following is a list of the tabs. Click on a item in the list to find out more info. You may also use the SEARCH tool in this help file to find and goto specific topics of interest.

TABS:

 EVENTS

 EVENT TYPES

 PROCEDURES

 DIRECTORY

 FAMILY

 MEDICAL TERMS


Events

The EVENTS tab is where the program always starts. This assumes you have done a little preliminary work such as adding your family members and healthcare provider names, etc.

A medical EVENT was intended by the author of the program to mean an occurence which you wish to record in your medical records such as going to the doctor. There are different types of events, of course, and FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL lets you define as many TYPES of events as you wish. This is done at the EVENT TYPES tab.

The EVENTS tab is where you (1) Add events to your records as they happen and (2) Review and/or print a list of historical events for a selected family member.

1 	The first thing you should do is select a family member. Do this by clicking on the control that says "Family Member". Click on the name of the family member you want to work with. This will cause a list of historical events to be displayed for the selected family member. Clicking on any of the events in the list will cause more detailed information to be displayed on the selected event.

2 	To add a new event, make sure you have selected the family member you want to work with, then click the ADD button. The family member name is filled in for you automatically. If the name is incorrect, click CANCEL and select the correct family member first. The date of the event is taken from the CALENDAR CONTROL. If this is not correct, click the appropriate date on the calendar to change the date. For (a) Event Type (b) Provider and (c) Procedure, you can select from your pre-defined lists. Fill in the other fields that are appropriate for the event you are adding such as diagnosis, comment, cost information, insurance status. Drug name is meant to track filling of prescriptions. To save the event, click SAVE.  Notice the event is added to the historical list of events for the selected family member. To cancel the event before saving, click the CANCEL button. Note there is only one procedure per event. If you need to add more procedures, you may repeat the same event with a different procedure.

3 	Under the selected family member name is another control that starts with the description "All Event Types". This control lets you limit the types of events that are displayed for the selected family member. So for instance, if you define "IMMUNIZATIONS" as an event type, then you can click on it to review all immunizations for the selected family member.

4 	Under the "All Event Types" control is another control that starts with the description "All Procedures". This control lets you limit the types of procedures that will be displayed for the selected family member. So for instance, if you have defined "X-rays" as a type of procedure, clicking on it will display a list of all X-rays for the selected family member.

5 	The PRINT button prints the list that you have displayed. If you limit the list to certain types of events or procedures, the printed list will correspond to your restrictions. If you select and display all events and procedures, the list will be a detailed medical history of all these events and procedures.

 EVENT TYPES


Event Types

Events are intented to be broad categories such as (1) Office Visit  (2)  Emergency Room, etc. But FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL is flexible and lets you define as many types of events as you want. To manage the list of available event types, click on the EVENT TYPES tab.

1 	To add a new event type, click the ADD button. Type the event description (up to 25 characters) and click SAVE to save the new type or CANCEL if you change your mind.

2 	To edit (change spelling, etc) of an event type, click on the event type in the list, then click the EDIT button or just click in the description field below the list. Type in your changes and click SAVE to save or CANCEL if you change your mind. You must click SAVE to save any new information you enter.

3 	To delete an event type, click on the event type in the list, then click the DELETE button. You will be asked to confirm your decision before the event type is deleted. Deleting an event type does not delete any actual events that you have entered under that type.

 PROCEDURES


Procedures

Procedures are more specific than events.  For instance, going to the doctor is an event.  Xrays and shots are two examples of procedures. To manage the list of procedures, click on the PROCEDURES tab.

1 	To add a new procedure for subsequent use, click the ADD button, enter the procedure description (up to 25 characters) and click SAVE to save the new procedure or CANCEL if you change your mind.

2 	To edit (change spelling, etc) of a procedure, click the procedure in the procedure list, then click the EDIT button or just click on the description of the procedure under the procedure list. Type your changes and click SAVE to save the changes or CANCEL if you change your mind. You must click SAVE to save new procedures or changes to existing procedures.

3 	To delete a procedure, click on the procedure in the procedure list, then click the DELETE button. You will be asked to confirm your decision. Deleting a procedure does not delete any events that you have entered for that procedure.

 DIRECTORY


Directory

We do need to keep track of the names and addresses and phone numbers of our physicians and other healthcare professionals, as well as pharmacies, hospitals, etc. FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL provides a means of entering and easily accessing this information on the DIRECTORY tab.

1 	To add a name to your directory, click the ADD button and fill in the name, address, and telephone information. To move from field to field, use the TAB key. To move backwards you can SHIFT-TAB. You can have two phone numbers for each name in your directory. If this is not enough, you can have two entries for the same name with different numbers in each entry. The telephone information consists of a description and a number. For instance:  Office 925-4363  and  Home 925-4000. The phone number fields do not force you to format the numbers according to American conventions. That is because this program is used by people around the world. Click SAVE to save the new entry.

2 	To view the details of each name in your list, just click on the name in the list and the details will be displayed. To edit the entry selected, click the EDIT button or just click on the field you want to edit and type your changes. Don't forget to click SAVE to save the changes or CANCEL if you change your mind. You must click SAVE to save new entries and changes to existing entries.

3 	To delete an entry from your directory, click on the name you want to delete in the name list, then click the DELETE button. You will be asked to confirm your decision. Deleting a name from your directory does not delete any events that you may have entered relating to that name.

 FAMILY


Family

FAMILY MEDICAL JOURNAL not only tracks medical information for yourself but for all your family members.  So if you have a big family, no problem except for paying the bills.

1 	To add a family member, click the ADD button and fill in the name, address, and telephone information (the address is optional of course) . To move from field to field, use the TAB key. To move backwards you can SHIFT-TAB. You can have two phone numbers for each name in your directory. If this is not enough, you can have two entries for the same name with different numbers in each entry. The telephone information consists of a description and a number. For instance:  Office 925-4363  and  Home 925-4000. The phone number fields do not force you to format the numbers according to American conventions. That is because this program is used by people around the world. Click SAVE to save the new entry.

2 	To view the details of each name in your list, just click on the name in the list and the details will be displayed. To edit the entry selected, click the EDIT button or just click on the field you want to edit and type your changes. Don't forget to click SAVE to save the changes or CANCEL if you change your mind. You must click SAVE to save new entries and changes to existing entries.

3 	To delete an entry from your family , click on the name you want to delete in the name list, then click the DELETE button. You will be asked to confirm your decision. Deleting a name from your family will also delete all events for that family member so make sure you really want to do this. You will be asked to confirm your decision.

 MEDICAL TERMS


Medical Terms

The last tab is titled MEDICAL TERMS. Although a few medical terms are included with the program, this is not intended as an exhaustive medical dictionary. Rather it is provided as a quick reference to common medical terms as well as giving you the ability to do your own research and save this information for later use.

1 	To add a term (medical procedure, drug name, whatever), click the ADD button and fill in the term and related description. Notice the program will tell you how many characters you have left as you are typing the description for the term. Click SAVE to save the new entry.

2 	To see the description for a term in your list, just click on the term in the list and the detail will be displayed.

3 	To edit an existing term, just click on the term in the list and click the EDIT button or click in the area you want to edit. Type in your changes and click SAVE to save the changes or CANCEL if you change your mind. You must click SAVE to save new terms and changes to existing terms.

4 	To delete a term, click on the term to delete, then click the DELETE button. You will be asked to confirm your decison.

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