Records and provenance

#The record object

country string

Two-letter country code of the source.

sourceId string

The source the record comes from, such as it.aifa.packages.

id string

The record’s identity within its source. Stable across collections.

kind string

The kind of record within the source, such as packages, ingredients or veterinary-medicines.

name string

The record’s display name: its first name.

names string[]

Every name the record can be found by, from its own fields.

identifiers object[]

Typed identifiers as { scheme, value }, such as aic, cn, ndc-package or din. Values are always strings.

data object

The normalized fields of the source, plus useDomain and targetSpecies with their evidence.

region string | null

A sub-national region when the source is regional, otherwise null.

retrievedAt string

ISO 8601 time the record was collected from its source.

sourceUrl string

The official dataset the record was collected from.

licence object

The source’s licence: id, url and the attribution text to display.

limitations string[]

What the source does not establish, such as current marketing or patient eligibility.

#Sources stay independent

Different sources may describe the same medicine. Medifontis never merges records or relates them by name; connect them yourself through identifiers such as an ATC code or a national code when the sources publish them.

#Identifiers

Identifiers are typed: the scheme says what the value is, and values are always strings, so leading zeros survive. Each source publishes its own schemes; the Search guide lists those of this country.

#Provenance

• sourceUrl links the official dataset the record was collected from.
• retrievedAt is when Medifontis collected it.
• licence names the publisher’s terms and the attribution to show.
• limitations lists what the source does not establish, such as current availability.

#What a record does not tell you

#Retrieve a record again

To refresh a record you saved, read it by its country, sourceId and id with GET /v1/drugs/record. It answers 404 when the source no longer publishes the record.

curl -G https://api.medifontis.com/v1/drugs/record \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $MEDIFONTIS_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "country=au" \
  --data-urlencode "sourceId=au.pbs.items" \
  --data-urlencode "id=au:pbs:items:10598T_12218_485_2863_43597"

const params = new URLSearchParams({ country: 'au', sourceId: 'au.pbs.items', id: 'au:pbs:items:10598T_12218_485_2863_43597' })
const response = await fetch(`https://api.medifontis.com/v1/drugs/record?${params}`, {
  headers: { Authorization: `Bearer ${process.env.MEDIFONTIS_API_KEY}` },
})
if (!response.ok) throw new Error(`Medifontis ${response.status}`)
const { record } = await response.json()

import os

import requests

response = requests.get(
    "https://api.medifontis.com/v1/drugs/record",
    params={"country": "au", "sourceId": "au.pbs.items", "id": "au:pbs:items:10598T_12218_485_2863_43597"},
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['MEDIFONTIS_API_KEY']}"},
    timeout=10,
)
response.raise_for_status()
record = response.json()["record"]