Billing for your medical store in Nagaland
Strips, bottles and loose tablets on one bill, and the monthly patient's page where you can find it.
Farming districts whose patients come to a town's medical store
Patients walk into a town's medical store from these districts and many more.
- In Mon agriculture is the main economic activity, with paddy the main crop, grown by terrace and jhum farming.
- In Zunheboto 80% of people depend on agriculture and allied work, mostly shifting cultivation.
- Dimapur is the state's main commercial centre, and its only railhead and airport are there.
Tools for a medical counter where one queue meets one pharmacist
Bills on your phone
A bill for a family going down to a hospital in Dimapur, the strips, the syrup and the ORS, sent to the son who pays.
GST bills
The mission hospital's standing monthly list of dressings and syrups, on a GST bill.
Low stock warnings
A warning when the insulin or blood-pressure tablets a village relies on fall low, early enough for the slow road up from the plains.
Credit book (khata)
A page for the far-village family that takes medicines in the rains and pays after the harvest.
Orders to suppliers
The order to the medicine wholesaler in Dimapur, sent before the monsoon, each box ticked as it comes off the truck.
Daily reports
Each rainy-season day's fever medicines on their own line, read before the next monsoon order.
One person at the counter, a half strip to sell and the patient who comes once a month
One qualified person behind the counter and a queue at the door
In a small town the person who reads the prescription is often the same person who takes the money and writes the bill. While he writes, the next patient waits, and the one after her. A medicine is found faster than it is billed, so the queue is made by the pen, not by the shelf. Patients who have walked in from far do not like to wait, and some leave without taking the medicine.
The rains, when fever reaches every village
From May the rains bring fevers to the villages, and families come down asking for the same few medicines. Paracetamol, ORS and repellent go first, the shelf empties within a week, and the wholesaler in Dimapur cannot send more until the road clears.
The only store still open after seven
In a small hill town yours may be the only medical store open after seven, and the late customers come with urgent needs and little cash. Some pay half and promise the rest in the morning, on a scrap that is lost by the time they return.
From the bill made while the prescription is still being read to the tablets that must never run out
The far village's rains medicines, billed before the road is wet
Before the rains cut the road to the far village, a family takes the wet weeks' medicines in one visit. Put each on its page with the day, and when the harvest is in, it pays against one list.
The ORS shelf read before the rains
Open last year's rainy weeks and read the ORS and paracetamol rows. This year's order goes in before May, when the fevers start and the road is still open. In May 2025 Nagaland's health department warned of dengue, malaria, chikungunya and Japanese encephalitis as the monsoon nears, urging repellents, window screens and bed nets, so the repellent cream and the coils belong on the same list.
The patient who walked down from the village does not leave with nothing
A patient from a far village makes a long trip down on a slow road, and insulin and blood-pressure tablets are the medicines that cannot wait for another trip. The wholesaler is in Dimapur, and an order that goes late is long on the road. If the strip is not on the shelf, the patient who walked for hours goes back up with nothing.
Questions Nagaland medical stores ask
Mosquito coils and repellent cream sell with the fever tablets in the rains. Can they be counted apart?
Yes. Make each its own item with its own count. The rainy months' report then shows how many coils and creams went out beside the medicines.
An ASHA worker collects medicines for several families in her village. Can each family's bill be separate?
Yes. Make one bill for each family, in that family's name, and send them all to her number. She is the one who carries them up and hands each family its strips.
When a landslide shuts the highway, which medicines go first, and how many days should I stock for?
Open the days the road was shut and read each medicine's row. The ones whose count fell fastest are the ones to hold deeper next time, and the number of days the road stayed shut tells you how many days to hold.
A nursing student buys her own kit every term. Can I see what she took last term?
Yes. Her page has last term's bill with its day, so the same kit can be packed before she asks.
Some medicines I keep in the shop and some I order only when a patient asks. Can the app tell them apart?
You decide. Set a lowest count on the medicines you always keep, and leave the others without one. The phone then warns you only about the ones that matter.
Pharmacies and pharmacists: what the numbers say in Nagaland
Nagaland had 1,157 pharmacies but only 278 registered pharmacists in February 2025, according to health department data quoted by the All Nagaland Pharmacy Association. That is fewer than one registered pharmacist for every four pharmacies.
The All Nagaland Pharmacy Association says Nagaland is the only state in India without a pharmacy institute, which is why qualified pharmacists are scarce.