What is a Prescription?

- This symbol originated in medieval manuscripts as an abbreviation of the Late Latin verb recipe, the imperative form of recipere, "to take" or "take thus". Literally, the Latin word recipe means simply "Take...." and medieval prescriptions invariably began with the command to "take" certain materials and compound them in specified ways. Today, when a medical practitioner writes a prescription beginning with "℞", he or she is completing the command.

A prescription (℞) is a written order by a physician or medical doctor to a pharmacist in the form of medication instructions for an individual patient.
It can also be defined as an order to take certain medications.
A prescription has legal implications; this means the prescriber must assume his responsibility for the clinical care of the patient.
Recently, the term “prescription” has known a wider usage being used for clinical assessments, laboratory tests or imaging studies.

What Are The Main Things On An Rx?

• Name of medical practice or physician,

• physical address of medical practice or physician (if multiple doctors are listed on a prescription, usually the doctor will circle his or her name for clarification),

• phone number of the medical practice/physician,

• name of the patient,

• the date the prescription was written

• All prescriptions, except for class II-V drugs, expire one year after they were written.

• Class II-V drugs expire 6 months after they were written.

• medication name,

• medication strength,

• sig (or directions to the patient, usually written in a medical language or abbreviated medically). Often the abbreviation "sig" will appear just before the directions on the prescription. "Sig" is short for the Latin, signetur, or "let it be labeled."

• number of refills, if any,

• “PRN” refills means as many refills as that patient needs for 1 year

• Class II medications never have refills-a new prescription must be brought to the pharmacy each time the patient needs that medication

• Class III-V medications are only allowed 5 refills(the original fill plus 5 refills)

• a DAW Code (or dispense as written code)

• The most common DAW code is DAW 0, which means that the generic drug was substituted for the brand name drug.

• DAW 1 means that the prescriber mandates that only the BRAND name medication be given to the patient.

• A DAW 2 means that the BRAND name medication is filled at the patients request.

• a prescriber’s signature (a prescription is incomplete without this important part of the prescription.)

• the prescribers DEA Number and/or their NPI Number.