A system and method are provided to associate a medication name with aninfusion pump and to communicate that association to a patient data managementsystem ("PDMS") for display and monitoring. In the case where the infusionpump does not contain a library of selectable medical fluid names thatincludes the name of the medical fluid to be infused, a separate computer willdisplay a list of medical fluid names for the infusion pump and the operatormay select the name of the medical fluid for that infusion pump. The computerwill then continually associate that medical fluid name with that infusionpump and communicate the association to the PDMS. In the case where theinfusion pump is capable of accepting an upload of new medical fluid names,the computer will upload an abbreviated list of fluid names so as not tooverburden the computer with the transfer of large amounts of data.
