Our local Rheumatology Unit has a number of patient information leaflets
etc. in Word (.doc) format. Asking them for supplies of these leaflets
for every drug they might use, and storing them where we can find them
when we want them is not an attractive idea, especially when they'll go
out of date, so I suggested they should be sent to practices directly as
Word files, or (preferably) presented on a website - where up-to-date
files can be picked up and printed off as required.
Unfortunately, when I tried this out in my consulting room, I found that
the top margin for one of the sheets was too small for my printer, and
the name of the drug it referred to was lost.
Investigating the margins on various printers we have in use in the
practice, I found a variety of different minimum margin settings, with
laser printers tending to need larger top margins, ink-jets needing
larger bottom margins, and photo-printers needing very small side
margins.
There is obviously a tension between ensuring that any printer can print
a shared-care form and having the maximum space on which to record data.
No doubt someone out there in GP-UK land has wrestled with and solved
this problem...
I have two questions for the panel:-
1. Assuming the Rheumatologists want to carry on using Word to prepare
their documents, what selection of margins (Top, Bottom, Left, Right,
Gutter, Header, Footer) will guarantee printability on currently used
printer?
2. If another mode of presenting documents would solve this problem
better, which one?, and how?
TIA
--
Michael
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