Controlled substances.

  Existing law classifies certain controlled substances into designated schedules. Existing law requires the Department of Justice to maintain the Controlled Substance Utilization Review and Evaluation System (CURES) for the electronic monitoring of the prescribing and dispensing of Schedule II, Schedule III, and Schedule IV controlled substances by all practitioners authorized to prescribe or dispense these controlled substances. Existing law authorizes the Department of Justice to provide the history of controlled substances dispensed to an individual to a licensed health care practitioner, pharmacist, or both, providing care or services to the individual. By January 1, 2016, or upon licensure in the case of a pharmacist, or upon receipt of a federal Drug Enforcement Administration registration in the case of another health care practitioner authorized to prescribe, order, administer, furnish, or dispense controlled substances, whichever respective event occurs later, existing law requires those persons to apply to the Department of Justice to obtain approval to access information contained in the CURES database regarding the controlled substance history of a patient under his or her care. This bill would extend those January 1, 2016, deadlines to July 1, 2016. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.