Animal Prescriptions and Treatments

 

Creating prescriptions and managing treatments for animals

 

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  There are two types of Prescription/Treatment for animals – Quick and Full.

 

To decide when to use Quick (Batch) or Full prescription:

 

Quick Prescription/Treatment is meant to be used for routine treatments and less information is gathered. Quick Prescriptions are usually used for one time treatments such as vaccinations or single dose de-worming. This is the type of prescription you would select for Batch entries. Quick is one and done.

 

Full Prescriptions gathers more details on the treatment. Full Prescriptions are often administered over a time period such as antibiotics. You would select Full Prescription for Multiple ID prescription entries.

 

 

Quick Prescription/Treatment

If you are adding a Quick Prescription for a single animal, you will enter that animal ID into the search field on the right of the screen as shown above.

 

A Batch entry is available only for Quick Prescriptions. You are giving the same treatment to a set of individual animals. One treatment record will be recorded for each animal. Batch entry is a great way to enter vaccines administered to a herd/flock. If you are adding a Quick Prescription for a Batch of animals checking the Batch Prescription checkbox will bring up fields where you can either select an Animal List, type in multiple identifiers, or use the lookup to find your animals. Animal lists are covered in a separate topic here  Animal Lists .

The Date Written and Start Date do not have to be the same but the Date Written cannot be after the Start Date.

 

The Treatment Item/Drug is sourced from the Treatment Dictionary. You can start typing in the name until it is recognized, or you can use the magnifying lookup to search for it. You may search by trade name or generic.  Timesaver : enter the first characters of the drug name, form and concentration to rapidly tailor the list to just a few choices.  Example: typing “Enrofloxacin” will return a long list of choices, but typing “Enro inj 100” will trim the list to 4 choices.  As you select drug names, ZIMS will identify the specific drug names and concentrations that you use frequently and over time they will display at the top of your list.

 

Although not a mandatory field, it is recommended to add the Delivery Route. If you choose a drug name that has a recommended route defined, the delivery route field will prefill dependent on what is selected in the Treatment Item/Drug box but it can be edited.

 

Administered By will prefill with who is entered into the Dispensed By field - but it is editable.

Bottle Information is optional and you can record an Expiration Date without recording a Bottle ID.

If you wish to track usage of a drug that has not yet been entered into your inventory you can select the Add New Bottle ID to add it. Once you Save, the information will prefill.

When data entry is complete, you can choose to Save and Close or Save and Repeat.  If you need to enter more single dose treatments to this patient, choose “Save and Repeat: new drug same animal”.

 

 

The treatment will display in the dashboard. Because a Quick Prescription is not on-going it will automatically display with a red dot as an Inactive/complete Prescription.

 

It is important to note that if you choose to edit a Quick Prescription, the Full Prescription screen is displayed for the editing.

 

Full Prescriptions

 

You can enter a Full Prescription for a Single Animal or for Multiple Animal IDs. 
 

If you select to add a new Full Prescription when an animal medical record is in focus the GAN will prefill. If not, you will need to enter an identifier or look for it.

 

 

Multiple Animals IDs means that multiple animals are sharing the same dose; not all animals may receive the same amount of the dose. Examples are mixing de-worming medication into the grain that your gazelle herd shares or adding medication to the water of your shark tank. If you select Multiple Animal IDs, the Select Animal IDs will display as 0 Animals Selected. Click on that button to activate the field to select your animals either from an Animal List, by typing identifiers in or using the lookup functionality.

 

 

The number of Animal IDs selected will display in the Select Animal IDs field.

If any groups are selected, then the Census count will display. The total number of animals the treatment is prescribed for will be automatically calculated.

 

In the above example, we have selected 5 individuals and one group with 8 members, so it is 6 Animal IDs and prescribed for a total number of 13 animals. You have the option to Record New Weight. However, in this example selecting the No Weight option would be appropriate.  For some multiple animal prescriptions, a group weight may be appropriate.

 

 

 

Same as for a Quick Prescription, the Date Written and the Start Date do not need to be the same but the Date Written cannot be after the Start Date. For an individual you have the option to Use Last Weight, Record New Weight or select No Weight. The last weight is often sourced from what had been recorded in the Husbandry weight grid. If you select to Record New Weight that data will be copied into the Husbandry module weight grid unless it is an estimated weight. It will be designated as a medical weight and can only be edited from within the prescription.

 

 

Treatment Detail

There are two ways to record the treatment detail. One is to enter the information into the fields manually. Use the Notes/Comments section to record any information not gathered elsewhere or to provide additional details on the treatment. 

The second way is to use the Dose Calculator. You can also check your Inventory here.

 

To calculate Dosage, ZIMS requires valid information in both the Dose and Weight Fields.

 

To calculate Dose, ZIMS requires valid information in both the Dosage and the Weight fields.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can also click to Search the Drug Usage Extracts by taxonomy, drug category, and/or drug name. This gives you information on drug usage from the global ZIMS community. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you are maintaining the drug in your inventory, you can click the hyperlink to Check Inventory and it will take you to the drug inventory record.

 

 

 

 

 

When data entry is complete, you can choose to Save and Close (module will close), Save and Repeat, or Save and Edit (module will remain open and additional tabs will become active).  If you need to enter more full prescriptions for this patient, choose “Save and Repeat: new drug same animal”. If you want to record the same drug prescribed for a different patient, choose “Save and Repeat, same drug new animal”. 

 

 

Another way to rapidly enter the same drug for a new animal is to save the original prescription and then use the “clone” button on the tool bar in the dashboard.  Update any details that are different (body weight, start date, etc.) for accuracy and you are done.  These are the fastest way to record a week long prophylaxis administered to a flock of penguins for example.

 

 

The next tab allows you to record the  Dispensing information. This allows tracking of who did the dispensing and who it was dispensed to. If the drug is not in your inventory and you wish to add it you can do so here. 

 

Recording this Dispensing information is not mandatory and will be used mainly for controlled substances that need to be more closely monitored. An example would be dispensing a specific number of oral Diazepam tablets to ensure bottle counts are correct.

 

 

An option under the Dispensing tab > Actions menu is to Print Label. You will select the type of label and then the location(s) for Printing. When you select Generate PDF to Print you will have the label for the drug container.

  

  

 

You can track the success of administering the treatment using the Administration tab. Use the Notes box to record additional details.

 

The administration records will display in the grid. Providing keepers with access to view/add/edit this screen will allow them to enter the details of administration directly into ZIMS.

 

Use the Staff Instruction tab to provide detailed instructions to the staff for administration of the drug. The information in the blue box is sourced from the Prescription tab information and will prefill when you select the Generate Instructions button. You can add additional text to reflect any special restrictions, and include any follow up observations required. In the screen shot below, the text in the green box is a free text entry. VERY IMPORTANT NOTE : If you are adding additional text to the instructions select the Generate Instructions first as doing so after will overwrite your free text entry.  Remember to save before moving on to print a treatment compliance sheet.

 

Selecting Print Staff Instructions will bring up a sheet with instructions and space for tracking the administration of the treatment.  Remember to save your staff instructions before moving on to print or the instructions section will be blank on the printed sheet.

 

You can write prescriptions to start in the future and a calendar task will result as a reminder.  Additionally, for treatments that last longer than 7 days, ZIMS will automatically generate a calendar task to review the case and determine if the issue is resolved or further care is required. More on the calendar features here.

 

You can schedule repeated Prescriptions into your Calendar using the next tab. Select one of the pre-defined schedules or customize the date you want to repeat it.
 

The Treatment Response tab is to record the overall response to the treatment and any adverse effects displayed.

Use of the Adverse Effects Note box is encouraged to record details. If an adverse effect is recorded, it will be analyzed in the global drug usage extracts to crowd source knowledge for the zoo medical community.

 

 

 

 

 

The treatment will display in the Dashboard as Active (green button) during the dates recorded for the treatment. Once the treatment end date is passed the button will turn red (Inactive).

 

Should you need to terminate the Treatment prior to the scheduled date > select the Terminate button located above the lower preview pane. This screen allows you to record Details as to why the treatment was terminated.

 

If Dispensing records were recorded, then after terminating, you will be redirected to the Dispensing screen to edit those records. The treatment will now display as Inactive in the dashboard.

 

If you need to edit the termination details, click the Terminate button again.
 

Associated Topics:

 

Medical- active prescriptions and treatments

 

Revised 5 March 2025