Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agency of the U.S. Department of Justice is charged with enforcing laws that cover trafficking in controlled substances.

DEA is a United States federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Justice, tasked with combating drug smuggling and use within the United States. The DEA agency licenses anyone who prescribes or dispenses drugs. It has sole responsibility for coordinating and pursuing US drug investigations both domestic and abroad.

The DEA agency has strict rules on prescription authority and record keeping. It assigns a unique DEA Registration Number to authorized practitioners and hospitals in order to keep track of the distribution of controlled drugs. Every prescription written in the United States bears a DEA number, that of the prescribing doctor. The DEA number is often used by the industry as a general "prescriber number" that is a unique identifier for anyone who can prescribe medication.

Source: Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)