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1-0-1, BD, TDS, HS, SOS meaning on a prescription

An Indian prescription is written in shorthand: 1-0-1 A/F x 7d, TDS, HS, SOS. The doctor writes it in seconds, the pharmacist reads it at a glance, and the person who has to take the tablets is left to work it out at home. This page reads each piece back in plain words.

It explains the notation, and nothing more. It does not tell you what to take, how much, or for how long: that is written on your own prescription, and your doctor and your pharmacist are the people to ask. If anything here seems to disagree with what you were told, what you were told wins.

The sentences in the Read back as columns are the ones DrBell shows under Understood as when the same shorthand is typed into the app, so the page and the app cannot disagree.

The three numbers: 1-0-1

Three numbers separated by dashes are morning – noon – night: how much to take at each. A zero means nothing at that time. A fourth number, when there is one, is bedtime.

"Morning" and "night" are not clock times. They are the meals: the first number is breakfast, the middle one lunch, the last one dinner. The same 1-0-1 is eight in the morning for one person and ten for another, which is why DrBell asks for your own meal times once and rings from those.

The numbers are also written with spaces or commas (1 0 1, 1,0,1), and mean the same thing.

Before or after food: A/F, B/F, W/F, E/S

The letters after the numbers say where the dose sits around the meal.

The thirty minutes and the hour are the gaps DrBell rings at by default, timed from your own meal times, and each dose's gap can be changed in the app. They are not a medical rule. If your doctor or pharmacist said "half an hour before" or "straight after", follow that.

A prescription can also say it per dose: 1 ABF is one after breakfast, 1 BBF one before breakfast, 1 AL one after lunch, 2 before dinner two before dinner. Each is read back on its own: 1 ABF becomes 1 tablet 30 min after breakfast.

How often, in Latin: OD, BD, TDS, QID, HS, SOS

Older shorthand says how many times a day rather than which meals. These are Latin abbreviations, and they are read as follows.

The food letters combine with these: BD A/F is twice a day after food, and reads back as 1 tablet 30 min after breakfast, 1 tablet 30 min after dinner. A number in front is how many each time: 2 BD is two tablets twice a day, and 2 BD A/F two tablets after breakfast and two after dinner.

Two things worth knowing about this family:

• BD is "twice a day", never "before dinner". It is one of the

commonest abbreviations on an Indian prescription, and reading it as a single evening dose halves the medicine. DrBell reads it only as twice a day; "before dinner" has to be written in words.

• SOS means only when needed, so there is no fixed time for it.

DrBell sets no reminder for an SOS medicine; it gives you a button to record one when you take it instead. STAT is a single dose given immediately, usually at the clinic, and gets no reminder either.

When the shorthand says how often but not when, DrBell spreads the doses over your meal times and says so: Read as "twice daily" using your meal times — adjust if the timing differs. That line is there to be checked against the slip.

Every so many hours: Q6H, Q8H, Q12H

Q and a number of hours (quaque, "every") is a clock interval rather than a meal pattern: Q6H is every six hours, Q8H every eight, Q12H every twelve. "Every 8 hrs" in words means the same.

The day starts at eight in the morning in DrBell, so the times above are where those fall. Every six hours includes two in the morning, and every eight hours includes midnight: the app says the times out loud before saving precisely so that nobody is surprised at two in the morning. If a night dose is not what the doctor meant, that is a question for the doctor, not a setting to change.

How long: x 7d

x and a number of days is the length of the course: x 7d, x 15 days, "for 5 days". It is always written after the pattern, never alone.

A course "for 7 days" starts today, today included, and stops after the seventh day. No end written means it carries on until the doctor says otherwise.

Stepping down: "then"

A course that reduces is written as stages joined by then: 1-1-1 x 3d then 1-0-1 x 3d then 1-0-0 x 3d.

Three a day for three days, then two a day for three days, then one a day for three days. Each stage but the last needs its own x Nd, because without a length the next stage could never begin. DrBell reads the stages back one at a time, each with its dates, before anything is saved.

A whole line, as the slip has it

Prescriptions put the medicine, the strength and the shorthand on one line. Reading TAB. GLYCOMET 500MG 1-0-1 A/F x 15 days left to right:

• TAB. is the form: a tablet. CAP., SYP. (syrup), INJ., DROPS

and OINT. work the same way.

• GLYCOMET is the brand name, as printed on the packet. It is never

translated; a name in another language may not be what the pharmacy stocks.

• 500MG is the strength of each tablet. It is not how many to take.
• 1-0-1 A/F x 15 days is the dose: one after breakfast and one after

dinner, for fifteen days.

Typed into DrBell as it stands, that line reads back as 1 tablet 30 min after breakfast, 1 tablet 30 min after dinner, for 15 days. A syrup line such as SYP 5ML BD reads back by volume: 5 ml with breakfast, 5 ml with dinner.

If the slip and this page disagree

They might. Doctors abbreviate differently, hospitals have house styles, and handwriting is handwriting. The rule is simple: the prescription and the person who wrote it come first, then the pharmacist who dispensed it. This page is for reading the shorthand, not for deciding a dose, and DrBell is the same: a notebook and an alarm clock. It never suggests a medicine or a dose, never changes one, and never says whether something is right for you. Anything that looks like advice on this page is a mistake; write to hello@drbell.app and we will correct it.

DrBell reads this shorthand

DrBell is a free medicine-reminder app made in Hyderabad. You type the prescription exactly as written, 1-0-1 A/F x 7d, and it shows you the sentence above under Understood as before it saves anything, times every dose from your own meal times, rings with a photo of the strip, and tells the people you choose if a dose is missed. It speaks 46 languages, and medicine names stay as the doctor wrote them. Get it on Google Play, or read how to add a medicine.