Question of the Week

The transfer of original prescription information for a controlled substance in Schedules III, IV or V for the purpose of refill dispensing is permissible between pharmacies on a one-time basis only. The exception is where the pharmacies share a real-time, online database — then transfers may be made up to the number of refills authorized. Schedule II has no refills to transfer — though since 2023 an electronic Schedule II prescription may be transferred once for initial dispensing between retail pharmacies, at the patient's request, under § 1306.08(e).

21 C.F.R. § 1306.25(a); cf. § 1306.08(e)

The shared-database exception is the whole question. Without it, once.

A registrant must notify the DEA Field Division Office in its area, in writing, of the theft or significant loss of any controlled substance within one business day of discovery. The registrant must then file a complete and accurate DEA Form 106 within 45 days of discovery — which is why neither 14 nor 30 days is the answer. The one-business-day clock runs from discovery, not from the loss. Most states separately require notice to their own agency on their own clock, so two deadlines commonly run at once — the federal one is the floor, never the whole answer.

21 C.F.R. § 1301.76(b)

Two federal clocks, both running from discovery and not from the loss: one business day for the DEA notice, 45 days for Form 106. Any state deadline runs alongside them, not instead of them.

After the initial inventory, a registrant must take a new inventory of all stocks of controlled substances on hand at least every two years. It covers every schedule, not only Schedule II, though in an opened commercial container a Schedule I or II substance must be counted exactly, while Schedules III through V may be estimated unless the container holds more than 1,000 tablets or capsules.

21 C.F.R. §§ 1304.11(c), 1304.11(e)(6)(i)-(ii)

Biennial means every two years, and it covers all schedules.

The quantity prescribed and dispensed on an emergency oral Schedule II prescription must be limited to the amount adequate to treat the patient during the emergency period. Dispensing beyond that is unlawful. A 72-hour figure appears elsewhere in the partial-fill rules and is a common import into this question, but it is not the emergency-quantity standard.

21 C.F.R. § 1306.11(d)(1)

72 hours belongs to a different rule. The standard here is the emergency period.

A fax may serve as the original written prescription for a Schedule II substance in three situations: for a resident of a long-term care facility, for a hospice patient where the prescription is for a narcotic and the practitioner notes it on the prescription, and for a narcotic to be compounded for direct administration by parenteral, intravenous, intramuscular, subcutaneous or intraspinal infusion. Outside those three, a fax is not the original and the written prescription must still be presented.

21 C.F.R. § 1306.11(e), (f), (g)

Three narrow cases. Everything else needs the original.