(1) A licensee or dispensing prescriber shall preserve a prescription, or an equivalent record of the prescription approved by the board, for not less than 5 years.

    (2) A prescription or equivalent record on file in a pharmacy is not a public record. A person having custody of or access to prescriptions shall not disclose their contents or provide copies without the patient's authorization, to any person except to any of the following:

    (a) The patient for whom the prescription was issued, or another pharmacist acting on behalf of the patient.

    (b) The authorized prescriber who issued the prescription, or a licensed health professional who is currently treating the patient.

    (c) An agency or agent of government responsible for the enforcement of laws relating to drugs and devices.

    (d) A person authorized by a court order.

    (e) A person engaged in research projects or studies with protocols approved by the board.

    (3) A pharmacist may refill a copy of a prescription from another pharmacy if the original prescription has remaining authorized refills, and the copy is issued according to the following procedure:

    (a) The pharmacist issuing a written or oral copy of a prescription shall cancel the original prescription and record the cancellation. The record of cancellation must include the date the copy was issued, to whom issued, and the identification of the pharmacist who issued the copy.

    (b) The written or oral copy issued must be a duplicate of the original prescription except that it must also include the prescription number, the name of the pharmacy issuing the copy, the date the copy was issued, and the number of authorized refills remaining available to the patient.

    (c) The pharmacist receiving a written or oral copy of the prescription shall exercise reasonable diligence to determine whether it is a valid copy, and having done so may treat the copy as an original prescription.

    (d) Except as described in this part, all other copies furnished must be used for information purposes only and clearly marked "for informational or reference purposes only".

    (4) Subsection (3) does not apply to any of the following:

    (a) Pharmacies that share a real-time, on-line database or other equivalent means of communication.

    (b) Pharmacies that transfer prescriptions pursuant to a written contract for centralized prescription processing services as provided under section 17753.

    (c) A parent pharmacy if the parent pharmacy receives a copy of a prescription from a remote pharmacy that it operates.

    (d) A remote pharmacy if the remote pharmacy receives a copy of a prescription from a parent pharmacy.

    (5) For purposes of this section, "equivalent record of the prescription approved by the board" or "equivalent record" includes a digital image described in section 17751(1).