Potpourri of Gentle Reminders (13-10-444)
♦ Louisiana is an “Orange Book” state, which means that only
those drug products that have been appropriately rated by the
federal Food and Drug Administration in its Approved Drug
Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations may be
dispensed by pharmacists as generic equivalents. Not every
generic product offered for sale is appropriately rated. Please
verify your pharmacy’s master drug list and inventory stock.
♦ Are you dispensing prescriptions written for animals by
veterinarians? If you are new to this area of practice, please
ensure you have acquired the appropriate knowledge and
training to dispense such prescriptions properly. The Board
has received several complaints of pharmacists altering dosage
instructions inappropriately and without contacting the
prescribing veterinarian, in some cases with tragic results.
There are significant differences in human and veterinary
pharmacology; human dosages are not necessarily analogous
to veterinary dosages. If something does not look right, please
consult the prescribing veterinarian.
♦ Is your pharmacy purchasing its drug stock from manufacturers and
distributors licensed to do business in Louisiana?
You can check their credentials with the Lousiana State
Board of Wholesale Drug Distributors at www.lsbwdd
.org. The incidence of counterfeit drugs in the US has risen
to approximately 1%. The risk of placing counterfeit drugs
on your pharmacy shelves increases when you do business
with unlicensed distributors. If the price of the drug product
in short supply listed in the weekly special that was faxed to
your pharmacy seems too good to be true, maybe you should
do a little extra due diligence before making that purchase.
♦ Now that the Board’s prescription monitoring program (PMP)
database is receiving approximately 3,500 queries per day,
the Board knows that more people – prescribers, dispensers,
as well as law enforcement and regulatory agency personnel – are
reviewing prescriptions dispensed for controlled
substances (CS) and drugs of concern more closely. Please
make sure you enter the correct prescriber’s name and Drug
Enforcement Administration (DEA) registration number
in the electronic record. Many pharmacy information systems default t
he prescriber entry to the prescriber of the
last prescription for that patient. The Board still receives
complaints about frequent errors in this data field, as well
as complaints about pharmacies not responding in a timely
manner to requests to correct those errors. Please remember
your requirement to maintain accurate prescription records.
♦ Pharmacies reporting data to the PMP – please make sure
your pharmacy software is able to transmit that data in the
format established by the American Society for Automation
in Pharmacy Telecommunications Format for Prescription
Monitoring Programs Standard 4.2.
♦ Pharmacists and Technicians – do you have your e-Profile
ID number yet? You will need to provide that number
to your Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Educationaccredited
continuing education (CE) provider in order to
receive credit for your CE activities. You can get that number
free of charge by visiting the CPE Monitor®
section of the
National Association of Boards of Pharmacy®