DEA number
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The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is a United States Department of Justice law enforcement agency tasked with enforcing the Controlled Substances Act of 1970. It shares concurrent jurisdiction with the Federal Bureau of Investigation in narcotics enforcement matters.
A DEA number is a series of numbers assigned to a health care provider (such as a medical practitioner, dentist, veterinarian) allowing them to write prescriptions for controlled substances. Legally the DEA number is solely to be used for tracking controlled substances. The DEA number, however, is often used by the industry as a general "prescriber" number that is a unique identifier for anyone who can prescribe medication.
A valid DEA number consists of:
- 2 letters, 6 numbers, & 1 check digit
- The first letter is a code identifying the type of registrant (see below)
- The second letter is the first letter of the registrant's last name
- Of the seven digits that follow, the seventh digit is a "checksum" that is calculated as:
- Add together the first, third and fifth digits call this CALC1,3,5
- Add together the second, fourth and sixth digits and multiply the sum by 2, call this CALC2,4,6
- Add CALC1,3,5 + CALC2,4,6 call this CHECK
- The rightmost digit of CHECK (the digit in the ones place) is used as the check digit in the DEA number
Registrant type (first letter of DEA Number):
- A - Deprecated (may be used by some older entities)
- B - Hospital/Clinic
- C - Practitioner
- D - Teaching Institution
- E - Manufacturer
- F - Distributor
- G - Researcher
- H - Analytical Lab
- J - Importer
- K - Exporter
- L - Reverse Distributor
- M - Mid-Level Practitioner (APN/CNP)
- N - Military Practitioner
- P - Narcotic Treatment Program
- R - Narcotic Treatment Program
- S - Narcotic Treatment Program
- T - Narcotic Treatment Program
- U - Narcotic Treatment Program
- X - Suboxone/Subutex Prescribing Program
Per US DOJ [1]:
Per US DOJ [2]: "Due to the large Type A (Practitioner) registrant population, the initial alpha letter "B" has been exhausted. DEA will begin using the new alpha letter "F" as the initial character for all new registration for Type A (Practitioner) registrations."
