RxNORM defines drugs. It declares that Warfarin Oral Tablet is the ingredient Warfarin combined with the dose form Oral Tablet. It tells us that this compound is sold under four catchy names, Coumadin, Jantoven, Marfarin and Narfarin.

But there’s more inside RxNORM’s awful release format, a hefty gem from the VA called National Drug File, Reference Terminology (NDFRT). With NDFRT,… Read More »

I’m not going to dwell on the horribles of RRF, the custom UMLS/RXNORM release format, but let me call out one …

104419|ENG||||||2701592|2701592|104419||RXNORM|SBD|104419|24 HR Felodipine 5 MG Extended ...
104419|ENG||||||2701593|2701593|104419||RXNORM|SY|104419|24 HR Plendil 5 MG Extended ...

It doesn’t jump out but find TTY, the lynchpin of the RRF format – each element of the normalized form can be… Read More »