Our community pharmacy has original prescriptions and hard copies dating back to before we started scanning. How long do we need to keep these?

Please refer to the Record Retention, Disclosure, and Disposal Guideline and the Record Keeping and Scanning Requirements Fact Sheet. 

Regulations under the Drug and Pharmacies Regulation Act require pharmacies to make and retain a scanned copy of all original prescriptions. However, the decision to destroy paper-based records after they have been scanned is at the discretion of the Designated Manager who should evaluate the backup processes in place to safeguard records for the required timeframe.  

In terms of the timeframe, all prescription records in the pharmacy’s possession, scanned or in hardcopy form, are subject to the retention period of a minimum 10 years after the last date of service provided to the patient. Since records cannot be destroyed until at least 10 years after the patient has ceased to use a pharmacy’s services (notwithstanding the provision for children under 18 years of age), the date of when a record can be destroyed cannot be pre-determined.  

Also, the patient record must be maintained as a whole, therefore dispensing records (hard copies) and prescriptions (originals or scanned originals) cannot be singled out for destruction. If the patient continues to use the services of the pharmacy, the patient record would need to be retained on file for an indefinite period of time (i.e., forever).