Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – Automated electrical financial or business practice or... – Health care management
Reexamination Certificate
1996-12-12
2001-05-29
Stamber, Eric W. (Department: 2765)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
Automated electrical financial or business practice or...
Health care management
C705S014270
Reexamination Certificate
active
06240394
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates generally to point-of-sale systems for use in pharmacies and, more specifically, to systems for automatically generating advisory and other information for distribution to pharmacy patients. Various systems have been used to distribute advisory and other information to pharmacy patients based principally on the identification of a prescription drug being purchased. Prescription drugs in the United States are uniquely identifiable by a National Drug Code (NDC), which is typically entered into a computer terminal by a pharmacist, and may be encoded on the product itself in bar-code form. Other prescription drug identification systems are employed in other countries, but the principle is the same: to provide a unique code for each prescription drug dispensed by the pharmacy. Based on the nature of the drug, a computer at the point of sale may be used to generate advisory messages to the patient, some of which may be required by governmental regulation, or to generate promotional materials concerning related or complementary products sold in the pharmacy.
Although such systems available prior to the present invention are satisfactory for some purposes, the advisory messages they provide are not always appropriately focused on the probable needs of the patients purchasing the drugs. Moreover, systems existing and proposed prior to the present invention typically require major software or hardware changes to existing pharmacy computer systems, the principal function of which is to print prescription labels, simple advisory messages and billing information. Ideally, additional functions should be provided without the need for major modification of existing pharmacy computer systems, other than to generate any additional data needed for the new functions. The present invention meets this objective, as further explained in the summary below.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention resides in a method and apparatus for generating advisory and other information without major modification of an existing pharmacy computer system. Briefly, and in general terms, the method of the invention comprises the steps of capturing a data record pertaining to a pharmacy transaction as transmitted to a pharmacy printer; comparing selected components of the captured data record with corresponding components of a database to determine the contents of a message associated with particular values of the data components; building an output message based on the results of the comparing step; and transmitting the output message to a printer in the pharmacy, to print an advisory message that is appropriate for the particular values of the data components defining the transaction. The selected data components include any combination of the identity of the dispensed product, the patient's age and gender, the identity of a party primarily responsible for payment to the pharmacy for the transaction and an indication of whether the transaction is based on a new or a refill prescription. Based on these factors, the advisory message can be tailored to the particular transction. Moreover, this goal is achieved without major modification of the existing pharmacy computer system.
In the context of the present invention, the terms “message” and “advisory message” include all types of information provided to pharmacy patients, including information about the prescribed product being dispensed, information about related products or procedures, promotional materials or discounts pertaining to the purchase of prescription products or other products, or simply news items pertaining to the dispensed product or to pharmaceutical products and health in general. The information may take the form of multiple-color, two-sided papers, depending on the available printer technology. Some of the information may be generated as a result of a patient condition inferred from, other factors, such as the patient's age and the type of medication prescribed.
The invention may also be defined in terms of apparatus for generating targeted messages to pharmacy patients, for use in a pharmacy computer system having a pharmacy processor and at least one printer. The apparatus comprises a hardware interface interposed between the pharmacy processor and the printer or printers, to monitor pharmacy data pertaining to each transaction in which a pharmacy product is dispensed to a patient; a database containing advisory message data in association with preselected combinations of components of transaction data; an additional processor, for comparing transaction data components monitored in each transaction with the preselected combinations of transaction data components in the database, wherein the advisory message data components associated with the monitored transaction data components are retrieved from the database; and wherein the additional processor also includes means for building an advisory message from the retrieved advisory message data components; and means for printing the advisory message for distribution to the patient whose transaction is being monitored. As in the method, the preselected combinations of transaction data components include the identity of the dispensed product, the patient's age and gender, the identity of the party primarily responsible for payment to the pharmacy for the transaction, and an indication of whether the transaction is a new or a refill prescription.
The hardware interface in the apparatus may take any of various forms, depending primarily on the configuration of the existing pharmacy computer system. For example, if the pharmacy computer outputs data in parallel format to its printer, the hardware interface includes a parallel-to-serial data converter, for sending monitored data in serial form to the additional processor, and the means for printing the advisory message includes a parallel data connection from the additional processor to the hardware interface and means within the hardware interface for mediating printer conflicts arising between print data transmitted from the pharmacy processor and print data transmitted from the additional processor. If the pharmacy computer outputs data in serial format to a printer, the hardware interface includes a serial data tap, for monitoring the serial data for transmission to the additional processor, and the means for printing the advisory message includes a parallel data connection from the additional processor to the printer, which has both parallel and serial ports and which includes means for mediating printer conflicts arising between print data received through the parallel and serial ports.
It will be appreciated from the foregoing that the present invention represents a significant advance in providing information to pharmacy patients. In particular, more targeted information can be provided in an automatic and convenient manner, without having to make significant modifications to existing pharmacy computer systems. Another important advantage of the invention is that, because it “eavesdrops” passively to obtain data from the pharmacy system print stream, any malfunction in the invention apparatus does not affect basic operation of the pharmacy system, which can continue to process prescriptions and print labels. Other aspects and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the more detailed description; that follows, taken in conjunction with the drawings, which are briefly described below.
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patent: 5515270 (19
Byerly, Jr. Baxter Hayes
Uecker Robert Anthony
Ward Michael James
Catalina Marketing International, Inc.
Giunta Jeffrey N.
Halak John J.
Stamber Eric W.
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