Guides

Guides for patients and clinics

Last updated 27 October 2026

A patient’s medical history usually arrives in pieces: prescriptions from different doctors, reports from different laboratories, scans from one hospital and a discharge summary from another. These guides explain, in plain language, how to keep those documents organised, how to read the ones that most often cause confusion, how to share them without putting privacy at risk, and how software that summarises records should be checked by the clinicians who rely on it.

They are written by Dipankar Deka, Founder, Vaidence AI, and reviewed against how the Vaidence product actually behaves. They are general information, not medical, legal or financial advice. Your own doctor, who knows your history, is always the right person to interpret your results and decide on treatment. If you spot something wrong or unclear, write to contact@vaidence.com and it will be corrected.

Understanding your test reports

• Patients, caregivers and new clinic staff · 8 min read Reading a laboratory report: reference ranges, units and flags A result only means something alongside its unit, its reference interval and the circumstances of the sample. Trends across repeated tests are more informative than any single number.
• Patients, caregivers and clinic staff · 7 min read Units on Indian lab reports: mg/dL, mmol/L and how to convert them A number means nothing without its unit. Indian reports mostly use mg/dL, while much of the world uses mmol/L, so a result from another country, or an article quoting one, can look wildly different from yours.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read HbA1c explained: what the number means, its units and how often it is checked HbA1c reflects your average blood glucose over roughly the last two to three months. It is a useful long-view measure, but one value, taken alone, cannot tell you how well you are doing.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Complete blood count (CBC) explained: haemoglobin, white cells, platelets and indices A complete blood count counts the three main kinds of blood cell and describes the red cells in detail. Its numbers only make sense next to the units and reference range printed on your own report.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Lipid profile explained: LDL, HDL, triglycerides and whether to fast A lipid profile lists several fats in your blood. The numbers are most useful when read together and in the light of your overall heart risk, which only your doctor can assess.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Thyroid function tests explained: TSH, free T4 and T3 Thyroid tests are read as a set, not one at a time. TSH is the usual first test, free T4 and T3 fill in the picture, and several everyday factors can shift the results.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Kidney function tests: creatinine, eGFR, urea and urine albumin Kidney health is judged from blood and urine results together. Creatinine feeds the eGFR estimate, urine albumin shows early damage, and one value should be confirmed by repeating the tests over time.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Liver function tests explained: ALT, AST, ALP, bilirubin and albumin A liver function panel mixes markers of liver cell injury with markers of how well the liver is working. The pattern across the results matters far more than any one flagged value.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Vitamin D and vitamin B12 reports: what the tests measure and their units Low vitamin D and low vitamin B12 are common findings on Indian reports. The numbers depend heavily on units and on which cut-off a laboratory uses, so they need careful reading with your doctor.

Looking after yourself between and before visits

• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read How to prepare your medical records before a doctor’s appointment A consultation is short. A one-page summary, documents in date order and a written list of questions let the doctor spend that time on you rather than on reconstructing your history.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Preparing for a follow-up visit: what changed, a symptoms diary and questions to ask A follow-up visit is short and focused on what has changed since the last one. A page of notes, a diary and a few written questions help you and the doctor use the time well.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Keeping a reliable medication list: a template for patients and families A current, complete list of everything you take is one of the simplest and most effective safety tools a patient can carry. It takes minutes to start and seconds to show.
• Patients and caregivers · 7 min read Home blood pressure monitoring: how to measure, log and share your readings Home readings can be more useful to your doctor than a single clinic reading, but only if they are taken the same careful way each time and written down in a form that is easy to review.
• Patients, caregivers and clinic staff · 7 min read Understanding referral letters: what they contain and how to help the specialist A referral letter is the hand-over from one doctor to another. The specialist can only use what reaches them, so checking that the letter and its attachments are complete is one of the most useful things a patient can do.
• Patients, caregivers and clinicians receiving referrals · 7 min read Discharge summaries explained: what each section tells your next doctor The discharge summary is the hand-over from the hospital to everyone who cares for you next. The medicines section and the follow-up instructions are the parts most worth checking before you leave.
• Patients, caregivers and clinic teams · 7 min read Sharing medical documents safely: photos, PDFs and messaging apps A readable copy sent through the right channel to a verified recipient protects both the usefulness of the document and your privacy. Send only what is needed, and prefer channels the clinic controls.

For doctors and clinic teams using Vaidence

• Doctors, clinic leads and healthcare technology teams · 8 min read Why every AI-generated clinical summary should cite its source document Language models write fluent text whether or not it is correct. Linking every statement to the page it came from turns a summary a clinician must trust into one a clinician can check in seconds — and keeps the clinician in charge.
• Doctors, clinic staff and administrators using Vaidence · 6 min read Signing in on a new browser: how Vaidence email verification works The first time you sign in on a browser, Vaidence emails you a six-digit code. After you enter it, that browser is remembered and later sign-ins go straight in. There is no authenticator app and no backup code to manage.

Want to see how a source-backed clinical workspace looks? The interactive product demo runs entirely in your browser on fictional records. For how Vaidence handles data, see security and the privacy policy.