A prescription medicine is a medicine that can only be made available to a patient on the written instruction of an authorised health professional. Examples of prescription medicines include blood pressure tablets, cancer medicine and strong painkillers.
All prescription medicines are registered in the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG) and can be identified by an AUST-R number on the label.
Key information
- See the Australian Regulatory Guidelines for Prescription Medicines (ARGPM)
- For more detailed information on prescription medicines go to Prescription medicines overview.
- For information on obtaining market authorisation go to Supply a prescription medicine.
- For information on manufacture go to Manufacture a medicine.
- For a list of standards and guidelines go to Standards and guidelines for prescription medicines
- Search the Prescription medicines collection
More information
- Prescription medicines overview
- Australian Public Assessment Reports for prescription medicines (AusPARs)
- Australian regulation of prescription medical products
- Prescription medicines regulation basics
- Variations to prescription medicines - excluding variations requiring the evaluation of clinical or bioequivalence data
- List of countries and jurisdictions determined to be comparable overseas regulators (CORs)
New prescription medicines
Product types