What is electronic prescribing (ePrescribing)?

EPrescribing is the computer-based electronic transmission of prescriptions between health care professionals and mail order or retail pharmacies.  However, an ePrescribing system does much more than transmit a medication prescription from a health care professional to a pharmacy.  An ePrescribing system allows health care professionals to check medication history, patient allergies, drug interactions, recommended dosage, payor covered drug lists, and much more to ensure that the medication prescribed is the safest and most effective choice for the patient.  Pharmacies can also communicate with health care professionals through ePrescribing systems.  

Many ePrescribing systems work with or are included in Practice Management Systems or Electronic Medical Record systems.  Because of this system interface, little or no manual data entry of patient information may be required.

How does ePrescribing work?

The scenario below shows an example of how an ePrescribing system may work:

1. A health care professional logs into an ePrescribing application that is connected to the Pharmacy Health Information Exchange;
2. The health care professional selects a patient record;
3. Patient health plan/payer eligibility is checked;
4. Information regarding eligibility status and ID numbers of the medications that a health plan/payer will cover is returned;
5. A health care professional selects a drug;
6. The ePrescribing application and exchange check for drug interactions, patient allergies, medication history, etc.;
7. Information is returned to the health care professional with alerts to any potential interactions, allergies, etc.;
8. The health care professional selects the patient's pharmacy of choice and completes the prescription details;
9. The health care professional sends the e-prescription which is electronically transmitted to the selected pharmacy;
10. The ePrescription activity is captured in the patient's record;
11. The pharmacy fills the prescription for patient pickup;
12. When refills are depleted and a patient requests a refill at a pharmacy, the pharmacy can electronically send the refill request to the patient's healh care provider;
13. The health care professional can then electronically authorize or enter a rejection code with free text regarding instructions or a reason for the request denial; and
14. As always, the patient still has the option to contact their health care professional directly to request electronic transmittal of a new prescription to their pharmacy of choice for continued refills or new medication.
    

Diagram of Complete Prescribing Workflow

Source:  http://healthit.ahrq.gov/images/apr07norcerxreport/RxInterimEvaluationReport_files/image072.jpg

For more information, click on this Frequently Asked Questions resource.