Page 23 - A guide to dosage form 1_full v3

PRESCRIPTIONS AND PREPARATION OF FORMULATION

PRESCRIPTIONS
You will soon be familiar with prescriptions that serve as one of the many mediums for communication
between physicians and pharmacists. In this course, we custom-made our prescriptions and they may
look like below:

SCHOOL OF PHARMACEUTICAL SCIENCES
UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA Name of clinic/hospital
11800 USM, PENANG, MALAYSIA
Tel: 04-6532211 Fax: 04-6570017

NAME: John Epkin Patient’s DATE: 25 February 2018
ADDRESS: 5, Halaman Bukit Gambir, Penang information & date AGE: 8 yo SEX: M

The formulation to be prepared and
Novobiocin Mixture BPC 1973 dispensed

Sig. 250 mg b.d 5/7 Mitte q.s Quantity to dispense

Direction to take the medication
Refill 0 1 2 3
Signature of physician
S.L Tang MD

According to the law (Poison Act 1952), Section 21(2):

Every prescription for any Group B Poison prescribed by a registered medical practitioner,
registered dentist, or registered veterinary officer shall:

(a) be in writing signed and dated by the prescriber thereof;

(b) state the address of the prescriber;

(c) state the name and address of the patient or, in the case of a prescription by a veterinary
officer, the name and address of the person to whom such medicine is to be delivered;

(d) indicate the total amount of medicine to be supplied and the dose; and

(e) specify the number of times (not exceeding three) the medicine may be dispensed and, if
dispensed more than once, at what intervals.

Thus, when you received such prescription, you would have to ensure the law is abided. Several
important things that you need to pay attention to:

- Is all the necessary information present and legible?
- If the patient is a child, is his/her weight is clearly written?
- Is the signature of the physician present?
- Is the formulation suitable for the patient? Is the patient having any allergy to possible
ingredients that will be used in the formulation?
- Is the dose proposed by the physician adequate?
If there are any inconsistency or incomplete information, you would have to ask the prescriber for
clarification. If all looks good, you can proceed to do the necessary calculation and preparation.

21