Definitions.

As used in this article, the following terms shall have the respective meanings herein set forth, unless the context shall otherwise require:

(1) ALABAMA INSURANCE CODE. Title 27 of the Code of Alabama 1975.

(2) INSURER. Such term shall have the meaning ascribed in Section 27-1-2.

(3) PERSON. Such term shall have the meaning ascribed in Section 27-1-2.

(4) COMMISSIONER and DEPARTMENT. Such terms, respectively, shall have the meanings ascribed in Section 27-1-2.

(5) CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATION. Any obligation under covered policies or employee benefit plans.

(6) COVERED POLICY OR PLAN. Any policy, employee benefit plan, or contract within the scope of this article.

(7) HEALTH INSURANCE POLICY. Any individual, group, blanket, or franchise insurance policy, insurance agreement, or group hospital service contract providing for pharmaceutical services, including without limitation, prescription drugs, incurred as a result of accident or sickness, or to prevent same.

(8) EMPLOYEE BENEFIT PLAN. Any plan, fund, or program heretofore or hereafter established or maintained by an employer or an employee organization, or by both, to the extent that such plan, fund, or program was established or is maintained for the purpose of providing for its participants or their beneficiaries, through the purchase of insurance or otherwise, pharmaceutical services, including without limitation, prescription drugs.

(9) PHARMACIST. Any person licensed by the Alabama State Board of Pharmacy to practice the profession of pharmacy in the State of Alabama and whose license is in good standing.

(10) PHARMACY. A place licensed by the Alabama State Board of Pharmacy in which prescriptions, drugs, medicines, chemicals, and poisons are sold, offered for sale, compounded, or dispensed, and shall include all places whose title may imply the sale, offering for sale, compounding, or dispensing of prescriptions, drugs, medicines, chemicals, or poisons.

(11) PHARMACEUTICAL SERVICES. Services ordinarily and customarily rendered by a pharmacy or pharmacist, including without limitation, the dispensing of prescriptions, drugs, medicines, chemicals, or poisons.

(12) DRUGS. All medical substances, preparations, and devices recognized by the United States Pharmacopoeia and National Formulary, or any revision thereof, and all substances and preparations intended for external and internal use in the cure, diagnosis, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or animal and all substances and preparations other than food intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man or animal.

(13) PRESCRIPTION. Any order for drug or medical supplies, written or signed or transmitted by word of mouth, telephone, telegraph, closed circuit, television, or other means of communication by a legally competent practitioner, licensed by law to prescribe and administer such drugs and medical supplies intended to be filled, compounded, or dispensed by a pharmacist.

(Acts 1988, No. 88-379, p. 565, §2.)