Electronic Prescription

E-Rx

pharmacy

Updated 5/15/2026

Definition

A prescription transmitted electronically from a prescriber to a pharmacy using certified e-prescribing software. Required for Schedule II controlled substances in many states. E-prescribing reduces medication errors and is tracked in PBM claims data as the prescription origin code in NCPDP pharmacy transactions.

Standard Abbreviation

E-Rx

Database Usage

-- Example column naming
CREATE TABLE claims (
  clm_id VARCHAR(50),
  e-rx VARCHAR(100),  -- Electronic Prescription (max 100 chars)
  ...
);

-- Example in SELECT
SELECT
  clm_id,
  e-rx as electronic_prescription
FROM claims;

Common uses in healthcare data

PBM claims adjudication and drug utilization review
Controlled substance monitoring and DEA compliance
Pharmacy data warehouse and ETL pipeline design
Prior authorization and step therapy workflows
Medicare Part D reporting and CMS submissions

Example database column name

ISO-11179 snake_case standard

-- Recommended column name
e_rx

-- Example DDL
CREATE TABLE healthcare_data (
  record_id   VARCHAR(50)   NOT NULL,
  e_rx         VARCHAR(100),  -- Electronic Prescription (max 100 chars)
  created_dt  TIMESTAMP     NOT NULL DEFAULT NOW()
);

Column names follow the ISO-11179 naming convention: lowercase, underscore-separated, using the standard abbreviation as a prefix where applicable.

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