Skip to Content

California Controlled Substance Prescription Law Revision

Tue 19th Mar, 2019 General

Early last week, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill (AB) 149 (Cooper) which provides a transition period for implementing a new law requiring new security prescription forms for prescriptions for controlled substances. The bill immediately went into effect March 11th, 2019.

AB 149 is intended to resolve problems unintentionally created by AB 1753 (Low, Chapter 794, Statutes of 2018), which reduced the number of authorized security printers approved by the Department of Justice (DOJ) and required security prescription forms to have unique serialized numbers. AB 1753 took effect January 1, 2019.

However, not all prescribers have been able to obtain the security prescription forms required by the law or have unknowingly continued using non-compliant prescription forms. As a result, some pharmacists were caught in a difficult position having to decide whether to provide needed medication for patients or comply with the new law.

AB 149 delays the requirement for prescription forms with uniquely serialized numbers until a date to be determined by DOJ but no later than January 1, 2020; and also declares that any prescription written on a form that was otherwise valid before January 1, 2019, or was written on a form approved by DOJ as of January 1, 2019, is valid and may be filled, compounded or dispensed until January 1, 2021.

Recent Blog Posts

Floors Prove a Source of Infection

Infection Control Today recently published an article on management of floors in healthcare facilities. Although your facility may not be a hospital, many of the principles certainly apply. Floors were... Read More

Why Neutralize High Level Disinfectants

It is illegal in some parts of the country to dump used OPA or glutaraldehyde down the drain without neutralizing it first. It is a popular misconception that used OPA... Read More

617 Candida Auris Cases in the US

A trip to the hospital might suddenly be even less desirable. A superbug considered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as “a serious global health threat’’ has been... Read More

Hand Hygiene and Pathogens in Public Restrooms

Many people use handwashing and hand-drying facilities in public washrooms under the impression that these amenities are hygienic. However, such facilities may be potential sites for the transmission of pathogenic... Read More

10.4% of healthcare workers tested were contaminated with patient bacteria following PPE removal

During a recent study of inpatient healthcare workers, more than a third of healthcare staff were found to be contaminated with multi-drug resistant organisms after caring for patients colonized or... Read More