Patient Wristband & Label Printing

February 2026 · 3 min

Overview

Patient wristband and label printing generates standardized identification bands for inpatients and adhesive labels for specimen tubes, charts, and medication bags. Wristbands include a barcode for scanner-based identification, supporting the five-rights verification in medication administration and specimen collection.

Wristband Format

Each wristband contains:

• Patient Name -- Full name in bold
• MRN (Medical Record Number) -- First 8 characters of patient ID
• Age / Gender -- Calculated from date of birth
• Blood Group -- Highlighted in red badge if available
• Admission ID -- For admitted patients
• Ward / Bed -- Current location
• Attending Doctor -- Primary physician name
• Admission Date -- Date of admission
• Barcode -- Code 128 barcode encoding MRN and admission ID for scanner verification
• Allergy Alert -- Red highlighted box if patient has documented allergies

Wristbands are sized for standard thermal printer output (280px wide) and can be printed in multiples (default: 2 copies).

Address Labels

Smaller adhesive labels (200px wide) contain:

• Patient name, MRN, age/gender, phone number
• Barcode for scanning
• Printed in sheets of 4 by default

These labels are used for:

• Specimen tubes (lab collection)
• Patient chart folders
• Medication bags and IV labels
• Radiology request forms

Printing

To print a wristband:

1. Navigate to the patient's IPD admission detail page
2. Click the Wristband button in the action bar
3. A print preview opens with 2 wristband copies formatted for thermal or standard printers
4. Print using the browser's print dialog (Ctrl+P)

The system uses the Libre Barcode 128 web font for barcode rendering -- no special barcode software is needed. For best results, use a thermal label printer (Zebra, Brother, etc.) with the appropriate label size.

Notes

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