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A prescription written by a French doctor is valid in all European Union and European Economic Area (Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway) member States. A cross-border prescription must meet certain legal requirements in order to ensure the safe delivery of medications and medical devices, and to guarantee that the prescription is correctly interpreted by the foreign health professional.

Indeed, the prescription must include the following information:

• The patient's identity: Last name, first name, sex and birthdate, weight and height if necessary.
• Prescription authentication: date of issue.
• The prescribing doctor's identity: Last name, first name, capacity, title or specialty where necessary, professional address specifying "France," phone number preceded by country code "33" and email address, prescriber's (hand-written or digital) signature, and date of the prescription.
• Medications: Common denomination of the product, i.e. molecule name. The medication must also be identified by its pharmaceutical form, quantity, dosage and usage instructions. If the prescription is for a biological medicinal product, it must also include the brand name of the prescribed drug in addition to the common denomination. If the doctor does not want the medication to be substituted with a generic, the brand may be written on the prescription along with the annotation "no substitutions" and the reason for this request.
• Medical devices: name and quantity of devices prescribed.

If you plan to travel to another European Union or European Economic Area (Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway) country, make sure to ask your doctor in France for a prescription that is in line with these new requirements.

However, your prescription for medical care or medications may be refused if the persons authorized to dispense medical devices or medications in other EU or EEA countries believe that this is in your best interest, or if they have legitimate, justified doubts as to the authenticity or intelligibility of the prescription, or as to the capacity of the healthcare professional who wrote the prescription.