Mail Merge Help

[yingying001]

Hi I am trying to set up a form letter for medical research interview
use. After interviewing each research patient, and based on the
patient's answers to a series questions, we generate a summary report
in Word document.

In the main document, I can set up merge for name, age, gender etc.

The challenge for me is this: there are, for example, 20 possible
symptoms. If the patient checked 5 of the 20, I will need the 5
symptoms to show in one area of the report, and the rest 15 go to a
different area in report. How do I accomplish this? Especially how do I
set this up in the source file ( I use Access).

I am pretty new in this, any help will be greatly appreciated.

Can anyone share a template with me if you have one that's similar?
Thanks!

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

In the Word Mail Merge main document, you would use If...then...Else field
constructions that evaluated the status of the checked field and either
inserted the symptom of skipped it depending on the status. You would need
these fields in both sections of your main document.

You may however be better off using a report in Access as that is where your
data is stored.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[yingying001]

Thanks for the reply.

Sorry I am new in this - my another question is when I set up the table
in the source data for the 20 symptoms, do I use each column for each
symptoms? Also, when I set up link in the main document to different
tables in Access, it doesn't work for me.

I am mainly dealing with one record (patient) at a time, rather than
mass records.

Is there any reading material on how to generating report using data in
Access? I know the how to create table in access, but that's more like
a data analysis than a report in word.

Thanks again,
Tracey

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

I think it would be best if we back up a bit. How is the information
recorded during the research interview?

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[yingying001]

We use a checklist during the interview to gather all the data, like
name, age, gender etc., including the symptoms that the patient has.

The goal is to set up the datasource very similar to the checklist, and
automatically generate a summary report, where the existing symptoms
summaried in one area of the report, and non-existing ones in a
different area of the report. (The symptom is only one category, there
are also other categories like treatment plan, family history, etc that
need to be handled the simiar way as symptom).

Right now, we use the form letter to deal with this issue. Of course,
it is not as efficient and accurate as we wanted. Need to set up
something better.

Thanks,
Tracey

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Well, I would use a userform with a multiselect listbox that was populated
with all of the possible symptoms and also had controls into which the other
data could be entered. The interviewer could then select the symptoms that
applied and when all of the data was entered into the form, would click on a
button which would transfer the data and the selected symptoms into the
required parts of the document and the unselected symptions into another
part of the document.

See the article "How to create a Userform" at:

http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Userforms/CreateAUserForm.htm


--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[yingying001]

Thanks so much for the direction. I will give it a try!