1. Stock counting versus injectable tracking
They look like the same feature and they are not. One answers “do we need to reorder”. The other answers a recall, a board complaint, or a patient asking what exactly they were given in March.
| Question | A stock count answers it? | What it needs |
|---|---|---|
| How many units are left? | Yes | A number per product |
| Which lot did this patient receive? | No | The lot recorded on the chart at the moment of administration |
| Who else got that lot? | No | The lot queryable across charts |
| What expires this month? | Rarely | Expiry held per lot, not per product |
| Did this vial stay cold? | No | Cold-chain noted on receipt, against the lot |
| What did we actually use versus sell? | Sometimes | Administration and sale as separate events |
The giveaway in a demo is whether the lot is picked at the moment of administration or typed into a free-text note afterwards. Free text is not tracking — it is a diary entry you cannot search.
2. When stock should actually leave the shelf
This is where systems quietly go wrong, and the symptom is a count that never matches the cupboard. There are two different moments and they are not interchangeable.
| Moment | What should happen | What goes wrong if you conflate them |
|---|---|---|
| The item is scheduled or added to a plan | Reserve it — committed but still physically present | Deduct now and the shelf count is wrong until the patient arrives, or forever if they cancel |
| The item is administered or dispensed | Move it — it has left, with the lot recorded against the patient | Only ever reserving means the count never comes down and nobody trusts it |
A cancelled appointment should release a reservation. A no-show should release it. Only an administration should move stock, and it should move it with a lot attached. If a vendor cannot describe that distinction, their inventory will drift and your team will go back to counting by hand within a month.
3. Dispensing is a different record from administering
Handing a patient a box to take home and injecting them in the room are different events with different records, and clinics that sell take-home medication need both.
There is a staffing wrinkle too, and it is worth raising with any vendor: a nurse or medical assistant handing over a supplement or a take-home item is not the same act as a prescriber dispensing a medication, and the record should not make it look as though a clinician authorised something they did not. In Aminova that separation is deliberate — non-prescribing staff dispense against their own plan rather than appearing to sign off a clinician’s.
4. Where each system actually fits
Inventory is the feature where general EHRs are thinnest, because insurance-billing practices rarely hold stock.
Retail-heavy aesthetics — skincare lines, a cash drawer, loyalty attached to product. Zenoti, Boulevard and Vagaro sell into retail-and-service operations and their stock handling reflects it.
Injectables as the core business — tox and filler by the unit, injection mapping, per-treatment consent. PatientNow, Aesthetic Record and Pabau sell into med spa work.
Supplement-led functional practices — a dispensary where the catalogue is large and the margin matters. OptiMantra and Cerbo sell into functional and integrative medicine.
Clinics holding prescription stock — vials with lots and expiries, cold chain on receipt, administration recorded against the patient, and a count that has to survive an inspection. This is the case Aminova was built for.
Where we are the wrong choice: if you need a full retail point of sale with a cash drawer and barcode scanning at the counter, or if product sales rather than care are the main business. Those are real requirements and we do not do them.
5. The boring parts that decide whether anyone uses it
Two things make the difference between an inventory feature that gets used and one that gets abandoned after six weeks.
Receiving has to ask for the lot. If the receive screen takes a quantity and nothing else, lots will never be in the system, and every downstream promise about recalls is empty. ⚠️ Worth checking specifically: a system can have excellent lot tracking on paper and a receive flow that does not collect it.
Adjusting has to be possible everywhere stock is touched. A count is wrong the first week. If correcting it is buried in a settings screen rather than available where the item is, people stop correcting it, and a count nobody corrects is a count nobody believes.
6. Frequently asked questions
Can we find every patient who received a given lot?
Yes, and this is the whole reason lot tracking exists. If the question ever comes from a manufacturer or a board, you want it to be a search rather than an afternoon.
Does it warn us before something expires?
Expiry is held against the lot rather than the product, which is what makes a useful warning possible — a product-level expiry date is meaningless the moment you hold two lots.
Does stock come off when we schedule something or when we do it?
Scheduling reserves, administering moves. Cancelling releases the reservation. Getting this wrong in either direction is the most common reason a clinic stops trusting its own numbers.
Can we track supplements as well as injectables?
Yes, as a catalogue tied to the care plan. The practical difference is that supplements are usually dispensed rather than administered, and the record reflects that.
Do you need our inventory to use the rest of the system?
No. Plenty of clinics run charting, scheduling and memberships for months before turning inventory on. It is not a prerequisite and we would rather you adopted it when the cupboard is actually causing you pain.