Glossary
Pharmacist Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential pharmacist terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key pharmacist vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in pharmacist training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Adherence
- Taking medication as prescribed.
- Compounding
- Preparing custom medications.
- Controlled substance
- A drug with abuse potential.
- Drug interaction
- When drugs affect each other.
- DUR
- Drug utilization review.
- Formulary
- A list of covered drugs.
- Generic
- A non-brand version of a drug.
- Medication reconciliation
- Comparing medication lists.
- NAPLEX
- North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination.
- PDMP
- Prescription drug monitoring program.
- PharmD
- Doctor of Pharmacy.
- Insurance approval before coverage.
- Residency
- Post-graduate pharmacy training.
- Sterile compounding
- Preparing IV medications.
- Therapeutic drug monitoring
- Measuring drug levels.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Pharmacist practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Pharmacist training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.