BNFI

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BNF-I
A One Act Play
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The Actors

• Carbon-based medical unit
• Clinical System
• BNF
• Ontology
• Patient

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A GPs surgery
CBMU Youre a fine looking young man. What could
be the matter with you?
Patient Im not really sure.
Does it hurt?
Yes.
Moderately.
Then you have moderate pain.
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System BNF, tell me what drugs are appropriate
for this diagnosis.
CBMU Lets see what the computer has to say
about this.
Types in diagnosis
Looks up Snomed-CT code and passes it to BNF
BNF Thank you for referring this question to me,
Clinical System. I am now looking up drugs that
are suitable for treatment of this condition.
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Enter Pharmaceutical Press Drug Ontology
BNF Hi Drug Ontology. Would you be so kind as to
tell me the dmd Virtual Therapeutic Moiety codes
of drugs that are indicated for this condition?
Ontology Certainly. Here they are.
Passes a Snomed-CT code to the ontology
Passes a list of VTM codes back to the BNF
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BNF Clinical System, here is a list of drugs
that I think may be suitable for your patients
condition.
Passes the list of VTM codes to the Clinical
System
Clinical System displays a list of drugs
CBMU Hmm. I will exercise my clinical judgement
and select this one.
Enters a number into the computer
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System BNF, we like this drug. Here are some
things I know about the patient. Do you foresee
any problems?
GetBNFMonograph dmd code, dmd codes for
currently prescribed medications, snomed code
for condition being prescribed for, snomed
codes for existing conditions, dmd codes for
drug allergies, snomed codes for non-drug
allergies, patient sex, patient age, patient
weight, patient body surface area, other
BNF Thanks. I will discuss with the Ontology
and get back to you in 500 milliseconds.
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BNF Hey, Ontology. I need to check some stuff.
Can you give me a list of synonyms for these
medical conditions?
Passes a list of Snomed-CT codes
Ontology Sure. Anything else?
Passes a longer list of Snomed-CT codes back to
BNF
BNF Thanks, Ontology. I may get back to you in a
minute.
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BNF Clinical System, here is a some XML that
contains a list of things you need to know about
before prescribing. Remind me to explain how I
worked this out.
Clinical system displays some information on
screen
System Hey, User. Read this stuff. It might be
important.
Looks in dmd
System If you want to go ahead and prescribe
this, here is a list of available products. Or
maybe you want to change your mind?
CBMU Hmm. I will exercise my clinical judgement
and select this one.
Enters a number into the computer
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System BNF, would you be so kind as to take a
quick look at this product and see if there is
anything else we might need to know?
Passes the same information again, this time with
a dmd product code instead of a VTM
BNF Always happy to help. I will get right back
to you.
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BNF Hey, Ontology. Can you give me that list of
Snomed-CT codes again.
Passes list to Ontology
Ontology Of course.
Passes back longer list
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BNF Hi again, Clinical System. Here are some
things you need to know before you give this
product to this patient.
Passes some XML containing information about
potential allergies to excipients,
product-specific interactions and other warnings
System Thank you for your quick response.
BNF Always a pleasure to be of service. Ill
charge 9.37p to your account as per our
service-level agreement. Good day.
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System Hey, doc. Take a look at this. What do
you think? Do you want to change your mind?
CBMU Hmm. I will exercise my clinical judgement
and go ahead as planned.
Presses a button marked Send to patients
preferred pharmacy
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Doctor takes a piece of paper out of the printer
tray and hands it to the patient
CBMU Here you are, patient. Heres a leaflet. Go
to your pharmacist. She will give you some
medicine.
Patient Thank you, doctor. I dont know what Id
do without you.
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Later, when the doctors are sleeping
System Hi, BNF. How exactly did you work out all
that stuff about drug alerts?
BNF Hi, Clinical System. You might find this
interesting. And now there are no doctors around
to bother us, Ill have time to explain properly