while (my $newUID = $sth->fetchrow) { if ($in{'requestID'} == $newUID) { $currID = $newUID; } else { $prevID = $newUID; } ... #there's a counter to generate one more loop after the currID is found, to capture "nextID" $nextID = $newUID; } print p(["Previous = |$prevID|","Current = |$currID|","Next = |$nextID|"]);