Medicine Search in mojApteczka — 70 000+ Products from the Polish NFZ Database
You’re in a pharmacy. Three people ahead of you. The pharmacist asks whether you have Apap at home — the doctor prescribed ibuprofen for the same pain, but paracetamol can help in the meantime. You pull out your phone, open an app that only knows your scanned medicines. Apap isn’t on the list. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have it — maybe you just never scanned it two months ago.
A dead end that now has a way out.
The problem: the app only knows what you’ve shown it
Traditional home-pharmacy apps have one limitation — they only know the medicines you’ve registered. If you have four packages in the cabinet that never made it into the app, for the app they don’t exist.
That works well while you’re at home and have time for inventory. Real life is different:
- You’re in a pharmacy and can’t remember whether you have a cough syrup for the child
- The doctor prescribed a new preparation — you want to read about it before filling the prescription
- A neighbour asks whether you have a specific blood-pressure tablet — she doesn’t want to buy a duplicate
- You’re packing a travel pharmacy and looking for a medicine you haven’t bought yet
In each of these situations you need access to the full Polish medicine database — not just what’s in your cabinet.
70 000+ medicines — where does that number come from?
mojApteczka pulls data from the public endpoint of NFZ (the Polish National Health Fund), specifically from the National Drug Registry. This is the official database of all medicinal products registered in Poland — prescription (Rx) and over-the-counter (OTC), innovative and generic, across the full range of pharmaceutical forms (tablets, syrups, drops, ointments, inhalers, suppositories, patches, injections).
The 70 000+ figure includes variants of the same substance — for example Apap 500 mg in packs of 12, 24, 50 and 100 counts as four entries, because each pack has its own EAN code and separate registration. That means you can find precisely what you have (or want to buy), not just a generic brand name.
Using the NFZ endpoint is free. You don’t pay for database access because it’s public state infrastructure — mojApteczka simply gives you a convenient interface.
How the search works in the app
The search lives directly in the inventory tab, in the “Medicine database” segment (visible as a tab next to “My medicines”). No pre-setup required:
- Switch the view in inventory to “Medicine database”
- Start typing a name — results update with every keystroke, you see matches from three or four characters
- Scroll the results — each entry shows the brand name, active substance (INN), manufacturer, and ATC code
- Pick a medicine — you get a detailed page with full information
- Buy or close — one tap redirects you to an online pharmacy search
No categories, no pre-filters, no complicated parameters. You type a name, you see results. Like Google, but only for medicines registered in Poland — and without ad tracking.
The pharmacy icon — the most important shortcut
The biggest value of search isn’t that you see other people’s medicines, it’s that you instantly know what you already have in your own cabinet.
For every result, the app checks your local database in the background. If there’s a match, a pharmacy icon (⊕) appears next to the name. You don’t have to switch tabs, you don’t have to remember the generic of your branded drug, you don’t have to guess.
The comparison is flexible. It handles small spelling variations, diacritics, and case differences — “Nurofen Forte”, “NUROFEN forte” and “nurofen forte” are treated as one and the same. Matching runs on both the active substance and the brand name, so if your cabinet has generic paracetamol 500 mg and you’re searching for Apap, both fall into the same group.
Real-world effect: you stand in the pharmacy, type “apap”, see a result with the pharmacy icon, know you have it, and don’t buy a duplicate.
Inline SPC documentation — full information on every hit
If a selected medicine has a counterpart in the offline SPC documentation, all nine clinical sections (indications, dosing, contraindications, interactions, adverse reactions, and so on) appear directly in the detail view — no separate tab to open, no redirect to an external website.
That means you can investigate a medicine clinically before you buy it. Particularly useful when:
- The doctor just prescribed something new and you want to check interactions with what you already take
- You’re wondering whether a preparation is safe in pregnancy or for a child
- You want to know which adverse reactions are common before you start therapy
- You’re comparing two preparations with the same active substance and want a better-fitting choice
No need to open Google or the URPL website. Everything happens on the medicine card inside mojApteczka.
Five real-world scenarios
1. Pharmacy queue
You’re buying a cough syrup for the child. At the counter the pharmacist asks whether you already have a fever reducer — the cough could worsen overnight. You type “paracetamol”, see the pharmacy icon on one of the results. You have it. You don’t buy.
2. Telemedicine prescription
A telemedicine doctor sent you an e-prescription for a drug you don’t recognize. Before filling it, you type the name and open the medicine card. You read the “Contraindications” section in the SPC — it’s not recommended for people with renal impairment, which applies to your mother. Before the appointment, you talk to the doctor about an alternative.
3. Alternate due to availability
The pharmacy is out of the prescribed medicine. The pharmacist proposes a substitute. You type the substitute’s name, check the “Active substance” section — if it’s the same INN as your original, you can switch. If different, medicine substitutes will show the full list of alternatives.
4. Packing a travel pharmacy
You’re heading to the mountains for a week. You type the medicines you usually take one by one. You see what’s already in the home cabinet (pharmacy icon), what you need to buy. A tap opens the online pharmacy search — you order before you leave.
5. Caring for an older relative
Your mother prescribed herself a new medicine after a doctor’s visit. She calls to have you “check it”. You type the name, read the dosing section for her age group — confirming the dose is appropriate. The “Drug interactions” section shows whether the new medicine is safe alongside the blood-pressure medicines she already takes.
Search vs. AI recognition — when to use which
| Situation | Feature |
|---|---|
| You physically have the medicine and want to add it to the cabinet | AI recognition — one photo of the package |
| You don’t have the medicine and want information | Medicine search — type the name |
| You want to know whether a medicine is already in the cabinet | Medicine search — pharmacy icon in results |
| You need an alternate for a prescribed drug | Substitutes or search by active substance |
| You need full SPC documentation | Medicine search — SPC is inline on every result |
Availability
Medicine search runs in the iOS mobile app and the mojApteczka web version. The search itself needs an internet connection (results come from the NFZ endpoint in real time), but SPC documentation on the result card works offline if it was synced earlier.
The feature is part of the standard toolset — no separate subscription. Technical details live on the medicine search feature page.
Download mojApteczka on the App Store and start searching the full Polish medicine database instead of browsing forums.
Questions about medicine search or other mojApteczka features? Write to us at kontakt@mojapteczka.pl.