---
title: Medication, Dosage, and Frequency Terminology
description: Use this glossary to explain common terms patients, families, and healthcare professionals may hear when discussing medicines, prescriptions, administration instructions, and medication safety.
---
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# Medication, Dosage, and Frequency Terminology
## Medication instructions identify the medicine, the amount to take, how to take it, and when to take it. These details should remain distinct during an interpreted conversation.
### Medicine identification and forms
- Prescription medication: A medicine that requires an order from an authorized healthcare professional.
- Over-the-counter medication: A medicine available without a prescription.
- Generic name: The established non-brand name of a medicine’s active ingredient.
- Brand name: A trade name under which a medicine is marketed.
- Active ingredient: The component of a medicine responsible for its intended effect.
- Tablet: A solid form of medicine compressed into a defined shape.
- Capsule: A medicine enclosed in a dissolvable shell.
- Suspension: A liquid preparation containing particles that are not fully dissolved.
### Amount, route, and timing
- Dose: The amount of medicine taken or given at one time.
- Strength: The amount of active ingredient in a specified unit of a medicine.
- Concentration: The amount of a substance in a specified volume or quantity.
- Route of administration: The way a medicine enters or is applied to the body.
- Oral: Taken by mouth.
- Topical: Applied to a body surface, such as the skin.
- Intravenous (IV): Given into a vein.
- Intramuscular (IM): Given into a muscle.
- Twice daily (BID): Taken or given two times a day, according to the prescribed instructions.
- Three times daily (TID): Taken or given three times a day, according to the prescribed instructions.
- Four times daily (QID): Taken or given four times a day, according to the prescribed instructions.
- As needed (PRN): Taken or given when a specified need occurs, within prescribed limits.
### Medication management and safety
- Refill: An additional supply of a medicine allowed under an existing prescription.
- Renewal: A new or extended prescription authorization from the prescriber.
- Side effect: An effect of a medicine other than its intended therapeutic effect.
- Drug interaction: A change in a medicine’s effects caused by another substance or medicine.
- Contraindication: A circumstance in which a treatment should not be used because of potential harm.
- Taper: A planned gradual reduction in a medicine’s dose.
- Hold: An instruction to temporarily withhold a medicine under specified conditions.
Medication names, formulations, abbreviations, and prescribing instructions may vary by country, facility, and individual treatment plan. A prescriber or pharmacist can clarify the applicable instructions. Interpreters should not infer unclear doses, units, drug names, or timing intervals.
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