The dispensing label
On this page11
What a dispensing label carries
The patient, the owner, the drug and strength, the dose, the frequency, the duration, the cautions and the clinic's own details. Call it seven things, all of which somebody at home has to read.
On a container that may be 30 mL
80 containers on this shelf are 30 mL or under. That is the right capacity for a dispensed liquid and a hard surface to fit seven things on.
Straight-sided bottles give more usable panel
A wrap label needs a straight wall. A tapered bottle or an imperial bullet cosmo looks better and gives you less, and this is where that trade-off gets paid.
Which is why the Boston round keeps winning
77 glass and 46 PET Boston rounds here. Straight wall through most of its height, a stable base, and a shoulder that does not eat the label area.
Type size is not regulated here and should be treated as if it were
There is no federal point-size floor for a veterinary dispensing label the way there is for a Drug Facts panel. The person reading it at 7am is the same person either way.
Put the animal's name first
Because a household with two animals and two medications is the situation where a wrong dose happens. The patient name is the field that prevents the commonest error.
And the dose in the client's words
One tablet twice a day with food beats a dosing interval in abbreviated notation. The label is a set of instructions for a layperson, not a chart entry.
A label has to survive the bathroom
Steam, wet hands and a fridge. A paper label on a glass bottle in a fridge door lifts, and a lifted label is an unreadable one.
White containers take a label better
163 white containers here. A clear bottle with a wrap label shows the label's back through the liquid; white gives a clean field and loses the view of what is left.
Which is the real trade-off
Seeing the remaining volume against having somewhere to print. For a short course the label wins; for a long one the client wants to see the level.