Converting MID function results into Text?

**SiemensIC** · 10-13-2010, 04:35 PM

Hello,

new to the forum and I am stumped. I am currently building a radiology system for a hospital in Chicago. So make a long story short, i have a procedure list from one of their other systems. their procedure description is 50+ characters long in some cases and my system is limited to 32 characters... so I used the MID function to strip out my text from their description... here is my situation

A1 = MID(A2,4,32) which returns "Addendum"
A2 = CT Addendum

I now need to delete the A2 column in order for an upload to my database... when I do that, I obviously lose my reference to A2. How can I convert my A1 result into TEXT so it stays put and I can delete A2 and upload via ODBC to my database???

Thanks, I really appreciate help with this one... it is a huge step in this system build

**NBVC** · 10-13-2010, 04:39 PM

Welcome to the forum,

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PLEASE PM WHEN YOU HAVE DONE THIS AND I WILL DELETE THIS POST

**Fcroft** · 10-13-2010, 04:45 PM

There is probably an easier way to do it, but you can copy A1 and "Paste as value".

To do this, simply highlight the cells you want to copy, hit the cop button (top left of Home tab, or Cnt+C) and press the dropdown menu where paste is (Home Tab). Select Paste Values. This will take out all formatting and simply paste what text showed in those cells. If you have to do this a lot though, you might want to create a macro if you're doing this a lot.

Hope this helps.

**NBVC** · 10-14-2010, 08:08 AM

In Excel 2003, after you copy , you go to Edit and select Paste Special then select Values.

**SiemensIC** · 10-14-2010, 09:37 AM

Fcroft and NBVC - I cannot thank you enough!! that worked like a charm. I truly appreciate your quick help and accurate info. It was so easy yet I couldn't wrap my head around it, I was trying CONVERT functions and everything but never thought of this.. THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!