Each medication listed under Section 510 of the U.S. Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act is assigned a unique 10-digit, 3-segment number. This number, known as the National Drug Code (NDC), identifies the labeler or vendor, product, and trade package size. Oral medication A medication is a licenced drug taken to cure or reduce symptoms of an illness or medical condition. ... The United States Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C) is a set of laws passed by Congress in 1938 giving authority to the Food and Drug Administration to oversee the safety of food, drugs, and cosmetics. ... A vendor is one who sells something. ... Packaging is the enclosing of a physical object, typically a product that will be offered for sale. ...

• The first segment, the labeler code, is assigned by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). A labeler is any firm that manufactures, repacks or distributes a drug product.
• The second segment, the product code, identifies a specific strength, dosage form, and formulation for a particular firm.
• The third segment, the package code identifies package sizes.

Both the product and package codes are assigned by the firm. This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...

The NDC will be in one of the following configurations: 4-4-2, 5-3-2, or 5-4-1.

Each item is barcoded with a Universal Product Code that begins with a 3 (UPC-A) or 03 (EAN-13). The remainder of the numbers are the NDC number, plus the check digit. Wikipedia encoded in Code 128-B Wikipedia encoded in Code 93 Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia encoded in the DataMatrix 2D barcode Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia in multiple languages encoded in the DataGlyph 2D barcode A barcode (also bar code) is a machine-readable representation of information in a visual format... The Universal Product Code (UPC) is one of a wide variety of bar code languages called symbologies. ... The Universal Product Code (UPC) is one of a wide variety of bar code languages called symbologies. ... European Article Numbering-Uniform Code Council (EAN-UCC) is the international organization of product barcodes that are printed on almost everything that is sold in stores worldwide. ... A check digit is a form of redundancy check used for error detection, the decimal equivalent of a binary checksum. ...

An asterisk may appear in either a product code or a package code. It simply acts as a place holder and indicates the configuration of the NDC. Since the NDC is limited to 10 digits, a firm with a 5 digit labeler code must choose between a 3 digit product code and 2 digit package code, or a 4 digit product code and 1 digit package code.

Thus, you have either a 5-4-1 or a 5-3-2 configuration for the three segments of the NDC. Because of a conflict with the HIPAA standard of an 11 digit NDC, many programs will pad the product code or package code segments of the NDC with a leading zero instead of the asterisk.

Since a zero can be a valid digit in the NDC, this can lead to confusion when trying to reconstitute the NDC back to its FDA standard. Example: 12345-0678-09 (11 digits) could be 12345-678-09 or 12345-0678-9 depending on the firm's configuration. By storing the segments as character data and using the * as place holders we eliminate the confusion. In the example, FDA stores the segments as 12345-*678-09 for a 5-3-2 configuration or 12345-0678-*9 for a 5-4-1 configuration.

External links

• FDA National Drug Code Directory