Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-4. Voluntary participation and donation conditions
(a) All participation in the donation program shall be voluntary. No health professional, insurer, agency, or entity shall force any person to participate in the pharmaceutical distribution program.
Terms Used In Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-4
- Controlled substance: means a drug, substance, immediate precursor, or synthetic drug in schedules I-V of chapter 28 of Title 21 with high risk of dependency and addiction. See Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-2
- Department: means the Rhode Island department of health. See Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-2
- person: may be construed to extend to and include co-partnerships and bodies corporate and politic. See Rhode Island General Laws 43-3-6
- Pharmaceutical redistribution program: means the program established pursuant to the provisions of this chapter for the redistribution of unused prescription drugs and shall include any facility that may accept the return of unused non-controlled substance prescription drugs and orchestrate their redistribution to aid persons of this state who have difficulty affording or accessing the non-controlled substance drugs. See Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-2
- Redistributor: means any person or institution partaking in the redistribution of non-controlled substance prescription drugs pursuant to the provisions of this chapter. See Rhode Island General Laws 23-25.6-2
(b) The following conditions shall be met for the donation of a prescription drug to occur:
(1) All of the donated drugs shall pass inspection by a licensed pharmacist.
(2) The donated drugs shall be received in an intact, tamper-evident package with a clearly displayed expiration date with no less than three (3) months until the expiration date.
(3) The donated drugs shall not be temperature-sensitive medications or a controlled substance.
(4) The donated drugs shall be provided to the recipient in accordance with state law. The drugs shall have been prescribed legally by a licensed healthcare professional after having been properly transferred to and processed by an authorized pharmaceutical redistribution program or redistributor.
(5) An authorized and properly licensed healthcare pharmacist shall deem the drug has not been tampered with upon arrival and is properly labeled. If labels have degraded but drug identity can be verified, new labels may be created. If the drugs have been combined in one package, the information about all included drugs shall be labeled clearly. If the drugs have been donated from out of state, this donation must abide by all of the laws of both states.
(6) The donated drugs shall have all prior patient information redacted in compliance with HIPAA regulations or the pills shall be transferred to a new container.
(7) If the drugs donated have been combined, the closest expiration date for any drugs shall be used for the entire package.
(c) If any one of the conditions contained in subsection (b) of this section is not satisfied, the donated drugs shall not be distributed pursuant to the provisions of this program and may be destroyed pursuant to department of health regulations.
History of Section.
P.L. 2022, ch. 402, § 1, effective June 30, 2022; P.L. 2022, ch. 403, § 1, effective June 30, 2022.