I described the chart summary I always wanted. Half an hour later it was live.
Every vet knows the scroll. A patient comes in, you open the chart, and the history is a long wall of notes you read top to bottom hoping the thing you need is in there somewhere. Copper's chart, my own one-year-old terrier mix, already scrolls for a while, and he's a puppy. A 14-year-old dachshund with dentals and back trouble and a bite alert is a different afternoon.
Last week Claude started writing a brief from the whole chart for me. That was useful. It had the facts. But it looked like a form, two columns of bullets, and I kept thinking about what I actually wanted to hold in my hand.
So Tuesday morning, between patients, I typed it out the way I'd say it, typos and all.
when i click chart summary for a patient, i am envisioning a nice looking summary "page" almost like a nice handwritten summary but nicer, something that is unique, but still has everything obvious ... like a vet would be able to grab a one page thing and know pretty much what they need about that pet? make sense?
A mockup built from a real chart, not a drawing. A red stamp for the alerts, a yellow box for what matters right now, the pet's story down the left side, and the last six visits as index cards along the bottom.
I said yes, build it. Then I remembered the treatment table and added one more thing: make it print nice, one or two pages of real letter paper.
The story
- Oct 23 The first chart brief goes live. It has the facts, but it reads like a form.
- Oct 27, 10:11 AM Between patients, I type what I'm picturing.
- 10:21 AM The mockup comes back, built from a real chart. I say build it.
- 10:33 AM I ask for a nice print option, one or two pages of letter paper.
- 10:35 AM It's live in my records.
- 10:37 AM Print checked. Copper fits on two letter pages.
What's on the card
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The red stamp
Alerts, like a bite warning, right where you can't miss them.
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The yellow box
What matters right now: what's due, what's open, what to watch.
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The story
The pet's history down the left side, newest first.
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The index cards
What they're on, vaccines, labs with the one high number in red, and the last six visits.
It was live in my records about half an hour after I asked. The print button puts the same sheet on letter paper, two pages for Copper. The video shows all of it, the before, exactly what I typed, and what came back.
Claude made the video too, from the messages I sent and real screenshots. The voice is George, a text-to-speech server running on a computer in my building.
If you've ever scrolled a chart in an exam room while the owner waited, you already know what to ask for. You don't have to know how to build it. I didn't.