PTCB Exam Study Guides

Generic names, brand names, and classifications of medications.

Identifying therapeutic duplications across a patient's medication profile.

Common or life-threatening drug interactions and contraindications: drug-drug, drug-dietary supplement, drug-laboratory, drug-nutrient, and drug-disease.

Strengths/doses, dosage forms, routes of administration, special handling and administration instructions, and duration of drug therapy.

Common or severe medication side effects, adverse effects, and allergies.

What conditions and symptoms a medication is indicated to treat.

Drug stability, including oral suspensions, insulins, reconstitutables, injectables, and vaccinations.

Proper storage of medications, including temperature ranges, light sensitivity, and restricted access.

Federal requirements for storage, handling, and disposal of non-hazardous, hazardous (e.g., P-list), and pharmacological substances and wastes.

Federal requirements for controlled substance prescriptions (new, refill, transfer) and DEA controlled substance schedules.

Federal requirements for receiving, storing, ordering, labeling, dispensing, returning, take-back programs for, loss or theft of, and destroying controlled substances.

Federal restricted drug programs and related medication-processing requirements, such as pseudoephedrine and Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies (REMS).

FDA requirements for medication recalls.

FDA product serialization, tracking, tracing, handling, and quarantining requirements under the Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA).

High-alert/risk medications and look-alike/sound-alike (LASA) medications.

Error prevention strategies, including Tall Man lettering, separating inventory, leading and trailing zeros, bar code usage, and limiting error-prone abbreviations.

Issues that require pharmacist intervention: drug utilization review (DUR), adverse drug event (ADE), OTC recommendation, therapeutic substitution, misuse, adherence, and more.

Event reporting procedures, including medication errors, adverse effects, MedWatch, VAERS, near miss, root-cause analysis (RCA), and continuous quality improvement (CQI).

Types of prescription errors, including incorrect dose, quantity, patient, drug, or route of administration.

Infection prevention procedures and cleaning standards, including handwashing, PPE, and cleaning counting trays, countertops, and equipment.

Formulas, calculations, ratios, proportions, conversions, Sig codes (e.g., b.i.d., t.i.d., Roman numerals), abbreviations, and medical terminology for days supply, quantity, dose, concentration, and dilutions.

Equipment and supplies required for drug administration, including diabetic supplies, inhaler spacers, oral and injectable syringes, filters, dilution solutions, and nebulizers.

Lot numbers, expiration dates, and National Drug Code (NDC) numbers.

Procedures for identifying and returning dispensable, non-dispensable, and expired medications and supplies, including credit return, return to stock, and reverse distribution.