So I use a datalist element to let my users enter a value. In my PHP code I check if it's set or not and then do some stuff.
Part of my HTML:
<form method="post">
<table style="width: 100%">
<tr>
<td style="width: 15%">Naam medicament</td>
<td colspan="5" style="width: 85%">
<input list="medicament" name="medicament" autocomplete="false">
<datalist id="medicament" style="width: 50%">
<?php
foreach($allMedicament as $medicament) {
echo "<option value=\"", $medicament, "\">", $medicament, "</option>" ;
}
?>
</datalist>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</form>
Part of my PHP:
if (isset($_POST["medicament"])) {
// this stuff is always executed, even when the user didnt enter or select anything in the datalist
}