How to use MedRec 2.0
- Start with your trusted medication list. Use the last known good medication list you believe is correct. This may be a current facility list, pharmacy list, patient portal list, discharge list already reviewed by a provider, or another list your care team trusts. This is your source of truth.
- Enter that list first. Paste the trusted baseline list into MedRec 2.0 as the medication list before the change.
- Enter the new list second. When you receive a new hospital discharge, pharmacy, portal, provider, or paper medication list, paste it as the new medication list.
- Review the comparison report. MedRec 2.0 highlights possible added, removed, changed, and unchanged medications, along with selected safety cautions for human review.
- Take changes to a trusted professional. If the report shows changes, bring or share it with your trusted provider, pharmacist, nurse, or care team before making medication decisions.
- Keep the reviewed report. After your care team confirms the correct medication list, save or print the report. Over time, keeping these reports can help create a history of medication changes.
- Use the confirmed list next time. Once a provider or care team confirms the current list, use that updated list as your new source of truth for the next comparison.
Medication orders only: do not enter names, dates of birth, medical record numbers, addresses, phone numbers, or other patient identifiers.
Compare facility orders with hospital discharge medications
A common post-acute workflow problem is comparing one facility medication list against a hospital discharge list that uses different wording, formatting, or medication-card structure. MedRec 2.0 is designed to support this compare-and-review step by reducing both lists to core medication details when possible, then flagging possible differences in drug, dose, route, schedule, added medications, removed medications, and duplicate orders.
MedRec is free to use, requires no login or account, does not request patient identifiers, and does not store medication lists.
Compare medication lists across different source formats
Medication lists rarely arrive in the same format. A facility order list, hospital discharge medication card, portal table, pharmacy-fill medication list, OCR-copied text, and dictated list may describe the same medication using different wording. MedRec 2.0 is designed to support this cross-format comparison step by organizing likely added, removed, changed, and unchanged medication orders for human review.
As a medication list comparison tool for skilled nursing medication reconciliation, hospital discharge medication review, and post-acute medication reconciliation, MedRec 2.0 helps teams compare facility orders with discharge medications without turning static examples into live clinical output.
Examples of medication-list formats MedRec 2.0 is designed to support
| Source format | Example text | What the tool tries to do |
|---|---|---|
| Facility order list | Lisinopril 10 mg PO daily Metformin 500 mg PO BID with meals Insulin glargine 20 units subcutaneously at bedtime |
Read standard medication-order wording and compare drug, dose, route, frequency, and instructions. |
| Hospital discharge medication card | insulin glargine 100 unit/mL pen Commonly known as: Lantus Inject 25 units under the skin nightly. |
Recognize medication-card headings, brand/generic clues, and instruction lines as one medication order. |
| Portal or table-style medication list | Medication | Instructions | Status Atorvastatin 40 mg tablet | Take 1 tablet by mouth at bedtime | Active |
Ignore table headers and status-column artifacts when they are not part of the medication order. |
| Pharmacy-fill style text | Donepezil 10 mg tablet - last filled 1 month ago - take 1 tablet by mouth daily |
Avoid treating fill-history metadata as a clinical start date, stop date, or medication change. |
| Dictated medication list | Lantus twenty units at bedtime Metformin five hundred milligrams twice daily |
Normalize common dictated medication wording into comparable medication-order text. |
| OCR-copied or wrapped text | potassium chloride ER 20 mEq tablet Take 1 tablet by mouth daily. |
Reconstruct wrapped medication lines when the copied text splits one order across multiple lines. |
Example cross-format comparison output
The table below is a static demonstration of how different source formats can still be organized into a structured comparison. It is not live output and does not contain patient information.
| Original Order / Facility | New Order / Hospital Discharge | Suspected Change | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hydrochlorothiazide 25 mg PO daily | N/A | Removed | A removed antihypertensive or diuretic may require review against the discharge plan and current clinical status. |
| Warfarin 5 mg PO daily | N/A | Removed | Removal of anticoagulation should be reconciled against indication, bleeding risk, and any replacement therapy. |
| N/A | Apixaban 5 mg by mouth twice daily | Added | A newly added anticoagulant requires review of indication, dose, renal considerations, and bleeding-risk monitoring. |
| Lisinopril 10 mg PO daily | Lisinopril 20 mg by mouth daily | Dose changed | Dose changes should be verified before admission orders are finalized. |
| Metformin 500 mg PO BID with meals | Metformin 500 mg by mouth daily with breakfast | Frequency changed | Frequency changes can affect glycemic control and should be reconciled with the discharge plan. |
| Lantus 20 units at bedtime | insulin glargine 100 unit/mL pen - inject 25 units under the skin nightly | Dose changed; brand/generic wording matched | Insulin changes are high-priority because dosing discrepancies can cause hypoglycemia or hyperglycemia. |
| Atorvastatin 40 mg tablet - take 1 tablet by mouth at bedtime Active | atorvastatin 40 mg tablet - take 1 tablet PO qhs | Unchanged after table-status cleanup | The word Active may be a table status artifact rather than part of the medication order. |
| Donepezil 10 mg tablet - take 1 tablet by mouth daily | Donepezil 10 mg tablet - last filled 1 month ago - take 1 tablet by mouth daily | Unchanged after fill-history cleanup | Fill-history metadata should not create a false medication change when the order itself is unchanged. |
| Gabapentin 300 mg by mouth three times daily | Gabapentin 300 mg by mouth three times daily | Unchanged with possible therapeutic caution | Unchanged medications may still require safety review when combined with opioids, sedatives, or other risk factors. |
MedRec 2.0 does not decide whether a medication should be continued, stopped, or changed. It organizes likely differences so a nurse, provider, pharmacist, or care team can review and disposition each item according to facility policy.
Format limits: Some raw structured EHR exports, FHIR-style data, and structured MAR/eMAR field-block layouts may need to be rewritten as one medication order per line before comparison. The tool is intended to support human-readable medication lists, discharge medication instructions, portal/table medication lists, pharmacy-fill text, OCR-copied medication text, and dictated medication orders.
Support skilled nursing and long-term care admissions
During skilled nursing and long-term care admissions, medication information may come from discharge paperwork, prior facility orders, medication administration records, pharmacy records, and patient or caregiver report. MedRec 2.0 can be used as a support step after a baseline list is created or verified, helping staff focus attention on discrepancies that need provider disposition.
Long-term care and skilled nursing discharge review
For LTC, SNF, and post-acute teams, MedRec can help compare a saved source-of-truth facility medication list with a hospital discharge medication list when a resident returns from acute care. The source-of-truth list should be the best available medication list from the time of transfer or the current facility record, stored according to facility policy. See the dedicated long-term care medication reconciliation tool page for a focused workflow example.
Reduce line-by-line visual scanning burden
Manual medication reconciliation often depends on visually scanning long medication lists and spotting small changes. That is difficult when the two sources use different wording or formatting. MedRec 2.0 helps standardize the comparison view so staff are not relying only on memory or line-by-line visual searching.
OCR-copied and pasted medication text
For paper records, users can copy medication orders with a phone or device OCR feature and paste the medication text into MedRec 2.0. The app attempts to clean medication-list formatting, reduce duplicate fragments, and remove obvious identifiers before comparison. OCR text should still be checked by the user because OCR can misread drug names, doses, and quantities.
Dictated medication lists
MedRec 2.0 also supports dictated medication lists for situations where typing is inefficient. Dictation can help enter simple medication orders, but the user should still verify the final list before comparing.
Duplicate medication order review
MedRec 2.0 can flag duplicate or same-medication multi-order patterns for review. Duplicate orders may be unchanged across two lists and still create confusion for medication administration, so these cautions are surfaced separately from the main add/remove/change comparison.
Personal medication list comparison
Need a plain-language walkthrough for individuals, caregivers, and families? See Personal Medication List Comparison Tool.