How to Create an Export File in Mckesson's Econolink 2000 Report Writing Tool for Price

How to create an export file in McKesson's Econolink 2000 Report Writing Tool for price updates in Rx-Link

1. Click on the desktop icon for the Report Writer ("Custom Reports")

2. Click on the tag at the top of the window titled "Formatting"

3. Hold the CONTROL button on the keyboard and use the left mouse button to click on the following field names so they will be included in the report output:

Therapeutic Code

NDC Number

Economost Number

Item Description

Average Wholesale Price

Contract Price(Including COG for Customer)

As you click on each field name, it should highlight, and then stay highlighted as you go on to the next field name. Do not let go of the Control (CTRL) button until you have clicked on all of the names.

4. To the right of the column of field names is an area titled "Sorting". Use the left button of the mouse to click first on the down-arrow beside the window in this area, and then choose NDC as the field to sort upon. You will have to left-click ONCE in the elevator shaft in the right side of this window to get to the NDC.

5. Now click on the RESULTS tab at the top of the screen and you will see it display a message as it builds the results of the report, and will then display a set of columns of the fields you selected above. You should see ALL of the fields on-screen.

6. The results should look like this, where each field is in a separate column:

7. Now you must move each column into the correct order for RxLink. Left-Click on the column title ("ITEM DESCRIPTION")and hold the mouse button down, and move the entire column to the left side of the screen, and let go so that the first column becomes the item description.

8. Repeat this as needed until the columns are in the same order as this:

Item Description

NDC Number

Economost Number

Average Wholesale Price

Contract Price(Including COG for Customer)

Therapeutic Code

9. Now you will tell the report to exclude any non-NDC drugs by right clicking in the NDC Column, anywhere below the header. Right-Clicking will bring up this:

and as you can see, you need to enter a "filter for" only those drugs with an NDC value GREATER THAN (>) eleven zeroes. Once you type the greater-than symbol and the eleven zeroes, press ENTER to save this - and you will notice in the bottom left corner of the screen a progress indicator as the query runs.

10. You should see more than 20 thousand records in the listing (see the bottom of the screen for the actual number). The screen should look like this:

Note the order of the columns - this is vital!

11. In the upper-right hand corner of the screen, left-click on FILES and then on SAVE AS , and make sure that you have "DESKTOP" in the top window:

and then type CROWN as the File Name. Left-Click on SAVE.

This puts a shortcut on your desktop for running the report in the future.

10. Clicking on this icon should start the report writer up, load the definition you just created, and let you choose FILE/Export to , in order to send the price update data to a disk file for RxLink to import.

11. You will be prompted for a format and a file name:

12. Make sure the window at the top shows C: as the drive. Type in as the file name : mckess and make sure the type you chose was CSV (comma-delimited). Click Save, and the price data will be exported from McKesson Econolink 2000 in the proper format for RxLink to import:

13. Now you must migrate the file to the computer with RxLink on it. Typically the file will be greater than the capacity of a 1.44 megabyte floppy diskette, so you should put a shortcut on your desktop that will compress the file into a ZIP file on a regular floppy diskette.

14. Right-click on the desktop, and on the menu that pops up, choose NEW/SHORTCUT. The window that pops up asks for a command.

15. Enter this, exactly:

c:\dease\pkzip -ex -a -&u a:\mckess.zip c:\mckess.csv

Substitute the drive letter where RxLink is installed on YOUR computer for the "C" in C:\dease .

16. Next it asks for a name, enter "Zip Price File", and click the "next" button.

17. It will then offer a choice of ICONs for you to choose from. Pick whatever icon you wish to have, and then click on FINISH.

18. Insert a floppy diskette into the Drive A: and then click on this ICON on your desktop to have the price file written to it. When you execute the shortcut you should see something similar to:

19. You will need another shortcut on your RxLink computer's desktop to UNZIP the diskette file and place it in the Crown subdirectory so that RxLink can find and import the data.