4.3 License by Endorsement, Renewal & Continuing Education

Endorsement (License Transfer) for Out-of-State Pharmacists

New York does not maintain blanket reciprocity agreements with other states — every out-of-state pharmacist seeking a New York license must independently qualify through licensure by endorsement, governed by 8 NYCRR §63.5. An applicant must:

• Hold an active license in good standing from another U.S. jurisdiction;
• Present evidence of meeting all requirements of §59.6 (the general licensure regulation) except the supervised-experience/internship requirement, which is waived for endorsement applicants; and
• Pass the New York-specific MPJE — jurisprudence knowledge is not portable between states, so even a pharmacist who has practiced for decades elsewhere must demonstrate New York law competency.

There is no minimum years-of-practice requirement in the home jurisdiction; an applicant may apply for New York licensure at any point after obtaining their original out-of-state license. Endorsement applicants do not retake the NAPLEX — clinical competency is treated as portable, but jurisprudence is not.

Endorsement Process

1. Submit NYS Form 1 with the $339 fee to the Board of Pharmacy (if this fee was already paid via a prior New York application, it is not charged twice).
2. Foreign-trained applicants also submit Form 2 for education/credential verification.
3. Complete NABP's Preliminary Application, then the Official Application.
4. After the Board reviews and approves credentials, NABP authorizes the candidate to schedule the New York MPJE.
5. Pass the MPJE at the scaled score of 75; NYSED then issues the license.

Special cases requiring direct Board contact: California licensees who have not passed NAPLEX, Canadian-licensed pharmacists, and graduates of foreign pharmacy programs follow modified procedures and should contact the NY State Board of Pharmacy office directly rather than the standard endorsement path.

Renewal Cycle

New York pharmacist licenses run on a triennial (three-year) registration cycle. The total renewal fee is $224, composed of a $179 registration fee and the $45 continuing-education fee required under Education Law §6827.

The 45-Hour Continuing Education Requirement

Every pharmacist must complete at least 45 contact hours of formal continuing education (CE) during each three-year registration period — a requirement with no exemption for newly licensed pharmacists, unlike many other states' first-cycle grace periods.

CE courses must come from NYSED-approved sponsors. OP conducts random audits; a pharmacist who cannot substantiate claimed hours may face prosecution for professional misconduct under the shared Title VIII disciplinary framework.

A Common Exam Trap: No Child-Abuse or Infection-Control CE for Pharmacists

Several other New York-licensed health professions — physicians, physician assistants, dentists, dental hygienists, and registered/licensed practical nurses, among others — must complete one-time or periodic child abuse identification and reporting training (under a 1988 statute, Chapter 544) and infection control training. Pharmacists are not among the professions subject to either mandate. An MPJE item that asks about "child abuse" or "infection control" CE hours for pharmacists is testing whether you know this carve-out — the correct answer is that neither is a New York pharmacist CE requirement. New York's pharmacist-specific mandatory CE topics are medication error reduction and pharmaceutical compounding only, plus the CDTM add-on for pharmacists who practice it.

Discipline Interaction

A pharmacist who fails to complete the 45-hour requirement, or who is dishonest about completed hours during an audit, is subject to the general Title VIII professional misconduct provisions (Education Law §6509), which can range from a censure and reprimand to license suspension or revocation. The same disciplinary framework applies to CE noncompliance as to practice-related violations, because Article 137 does not maintain a separate pharmacy-only sanctions schedule — statutory misdemeanor violations under §6811 are instead handled criminally, in parallel with any Board disciplinary action.

A typical misconduct case moves through several stages: a complaint reaches OP's Office of Professional Discipline (directly, or referred from the Board, the DEA, or law enforcement); OP investigates, which for a pharmacist may include review of dispensing records and Prescription Monitoring Program (PMP) data; if warranted, the Department files formal charges; the pharmacist is entitled to a hearing with the right to counsel and to present evidence; and the case concludes with a determination ranging from dismissal to license revocation. Many cases resolve short of a full hearing through a consent order, in which the pharmacist stipulates to the facts and an agreed sanction — consent orders become part of the public disciplinary record.

Common MPJE Scenarios

• Endorsement without NAPLEX retake: A pharmacist licensed 15 years in Florida relocates to New York. They are not required to retake NAPLEX or complete a new internship, but must pass the NY MPJE — the exam exists precisely because clinical competency, once demonstrated, is treated as durable, while state-specific legal knowledge is not.
• Missed CE topic hours: A pharmacist logs 45 total CE hours but all of it is general pharmacology, with none in medication-error reduction or compounding. This pharmacist is not in compliance — the topic-specific minimums are mandatory subsets of the 45 hours, not optional add-ons.
• CDTM without the extra 5 hours: A pharmacist begins practicing under a new collaborative drug therapy management agreement mid-cycle but completes only the base 45 CE hours. They are short by 5 hours and out of compliance for that triennial period.
• Audit mismatch: During a random audit, a pharmacist cannot produce documentation for 6 of their claimed 45 hours. Because records must be retained for 6 years, the pharmacist bears the burden of proof; inability to substantiate hours can lead to a misconduct referral even if the hours were, in fact, completed.

Exam Traps

• Endorsement applicants must pass the NY MPJE but are not required to retake NAPLEX or repeat the internship.
• CE topic hours are medication error reduction (3 hrs, since 2003) and compounding (3 hrs, since 2023) — NOT child abuse or infection control, which do not apply to pharmacists.
• CDTM practitioners owe an additional 5 CE hours on top of the base 45.