Pharmacy Technician Certification Examination® (PTCE®) Content Outline

Effective Date

  • The outlined content is effective as of January 6, 2026.

Knowledge Domains and Areas and Their Percentage of PTCE® Exam Content

1. Medications (35%)
  • 1.1 Generic names, brand names, and classifications of medications
  • 1.2 Therapeutic duplications
  • 1.3 Common or life-threatening drug interactions and contraindications, including
    • Drug-drug interactions
    • Drug-dietary supplement interactions
    • Drug-laboratory interactions
    • Drug-nutrient interactions
    • Drug-disease interactions
  • 1.4* Strengths/doses, dosage forms, routes of administration, special handling and administration instructions, and duration of drug therapy
  • 1.5 Common or severe medication side effects, adverse effects, and allergies
  • 1.6 Indications of medications
  • 1.7* Drug stability, including
    • Oral suspensions
    • Insulins
    • Reconstitutables
    • Injectables
    • Vaccinations
  • 1.8 Proper storage of medications, focusing on
    • Temperature ranges
    • Light sensitivity
    • Restricted access
2. Federal Requirements (18.75%)
  • 2.1 Federal requirements for the storage, handling, and disposal of
    • Non-hazardous
    • Hazardous (e.g., P-list) substances
    • Pharmacological substances and wastes
  • 2.2* Federal requirements for controlled substance prescriptions
    • New prescriptions
    • Refills
    • Transfers
    • Mention of DEA controlled substance schedules
  • 2.3 Federal requirements concerning
    • Receiving and storing controlled substances
    • Ordering and labeling controlled substances
    • Dispensing, returning, take-back programs for controlled substances
    • Loss or theft of controlled substances
    • Destruction of controlled substances
  • 2.4* Federal restricted drug programs and related medication-processing requirements, such as
    • Pseudoephedrine regulations
    • Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies (REMS)
  • 2.5 FDA requirements for medication recalls
  • 2.6 FDA product serialization, tracking, tracing, handling, and quarantining requirements, referencing
    • Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA)
3. Patient Safety and Quality Assurance (23.75%)
  • 3.1 High-alert/risk medications and look-alike/sound-alike (LASA) medications
  • 3.2 Error prevention strategies such as
    • Correcting patient prescriptions or medication orders
    • Use of Tall Man lettering
    • Separation of inventory
    • Use of leading and trailing zeros
    • Bar code usage
    • Limiting the use of error-prone abbreviations
  • 3.3* Issues that require pharmacist intervention, for instance
    • Drug utilization review (DUR)
    • Adverse drug events (ADE)
    • Over-the-counter medication recommendations
    • Therapeutic substitution
    • Misuse and adherence
    • Post-immunization delivery care
    • Allergies and drug interactions
  • 3.4 Event reporting procedures including
    • Reporting medication errors and adverse effects
    • Product integrity concerns
    • MedWatch, VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System)
    • Near misses
    • Root-cause analysis (RCA)
    • Continuous quality improvement (CQI)
  • 3.5* Types of prescription errors, including
    • Incorrect dose
    • Incorrect quantity
    • Incorrect patient
    • Incorrect drug
    • Incorrect route of administration
  • 3.6 Infection prevention procedures and cleaning standards encompassing
    • Handwashing
    • Use of personal protective equipment (PPE)
    • Cleaning counting trays, countertops, and equipment
4. Order Entry and Processing (22.50%)
  • 4.1* Formulas, calculations, ratios, proportions, and conversions, including
    • Sig codes (e.g., b.i.d., t.i.d., Roman numerals)
    • Abbreviations, medical terminology, and symbols for days supply, quantity, dose, concentration, and dilutions
  • 4.2* Equipment and supplies required for drug administration, such as
    • Diabetic supplies
    • Inhaler spacers
    • Oral syringes
    • Injectable syringes
    • Filters and dilution solutions
    • Immunization supplies
    • Nebulizers
  • 4.3* Lot numbers, expiration dates, and National Drug Code (NDC) numbers
  • 4.4 Procedures for identifying and returning dispensable, non-dispensable, and expired medications and supplies, including
    • Credit return
    • Return to stock
    • Reverse distribution