Track & Trace

With the potential to enhance the customer experience and increase brand recognition, QR codes have become a popular marketing tool. The widespread use of QR codes has increased consumer familiarity and comfort with the technology, which is likely to continue to drive adoption. As QR codes become more widely used and familiar among consumers, they offer a versatile and measurable approach for businesses to optimise their marketing efforts

Golden State Medical Supply has recalled bottles of Atenolol, a blood pressure medication, and Clopidogrel, a medication aimed at heart issues after the manufacturer discovered that labels had been switched on some of the bottles.

The recall comes three weeks after a packaging mix-up led to the recall of a blood pressure medication and a second medication designed to lower the risk of having a stroke or serious heart problems, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration reported.

The recall was initiated after the company received a product complaint report from a hospital pharmacy that vials labeled as "Daptomycin for Injection 500 mg/vial" were found in cartons labeled as "Daptomycin for Injection 350 mg/vial".

Dynamsoft Panorama™ is an enhanced module of Dynamsoft Barcode Reader. It stitches video frames into one panoramic view with all of your barcodes. This groundbreaking proprietary technology provides complete coverage of a site and detailed information with batch barcode scanning capabilities. Dynamsoft Panorama™ can empower any business that requires efficient batch scanning to achieve a true 100% barcode scan success rate when used to its full ability.

The importance of sustainability leads to technological advances in the packaging industry. Smart packaging delivers real-time data and improves quality assurance. Startups are developing smart packaging solutions to combat excessive waste, prevent counterfeiting, sustain product quality, monitor freshness, and extend product shelf life. For this, they leverage innovations in circuit miniaturization, radio frequency identification (RFID), and the internet of things (IoT) to monitor product life.

Drug counterfeiting is a significant and growing issue in the innovations-lacking pharmaceutical industry. It poses major health and safety threats to the public, but it also affects legitimate producers as they lose sales and risk harming their reputations. International organizations, governmental law enforcement, and policy-making authorities, as well as pharmaceutical activists, are taking a number of actions to prevent fake medicines from entering the markets, however, it is not always enough. In this article, we share some tactics manufacturers, CMOs, wholesalers, 3PLs and dispensers can implement to protect their brands, business partners, and customers.

The company says the packaging uses natural biotechnology, applicable to all types of packaging, which can help to reduce claims for spoilage by maintaining a good organoleptic profile for longer. It has created a unique copper microparticle which, when incorporated into the packaging, will naturally eliminate the microorganisms present, extending the useful life of the food, it says.

Les adieux dureront plusieurs années comme il se doit pour une étoile des rayons et de l'industrie. Le code à barres disparaîtra des emballages de pâtes, de gâteaux ou des bouteilles de jus de fruits en 2027. Le symbole aux 24 barres qui représentent les 13 chiffres identifiant chaque produit d'un supermarché comme les pièces détachées de l'industrie sera remplacé par un QR Code, pas n'importe lequel, un QR Code « augmenté ». Ainsi l'ont décidé les dirigeants de Global Standard 1, GS1 en abrégé, qui fête ses 50 ans.

When it comes to pharmaceutical products, serialisation can extend far beyond protecting patients from the risk of counterfeits. It can facilitate increased patient health and safety in pharmacies, hospitals, and community healthcare settings. With more sophisticated serialisation of prescription and non-prescription pharmaceuticals, healthcare staff can ensure that a medicine is not counterfeit and that the right patient gets the right dose, of the right medication, at the right time. 

The use of QR codes has grown since the pandemic, when they became a popular way for smartphone users to share contact information and vaccination status with restaurants and other venues. But scammers have found ways that QR codes can be used to trick victims into sharing personal information and bank details.

For the packaging of pharmaceutical products, Stegemann relies on serialisation solutions from Mettler-Toledo. A cloud-based software solution from tracekey solutions GmbH supports the recording and processing of serialisation orders.

Der digitale Wandel in Forschung und Gesundheit ist längst im Gang: Wie sieht das Gesundheitssystem der Zukunft aus? Welche Konsequenzen hat die Digitalisierung für die medizinische Versorgung? Damit die digitalen Technologien zum Vorteil von Patienten und Versicherten eingesetzt werden, müssen Politik und Wirtschaft eng kooperieren.

A special seal indicates that the prefilled syringe has been opened before and helps protect its integrity up to final use. The novel combination of needle and product protection will be showcased for the first time at Pharmapack in Paris, in early February.

During the recent CES show in Las Vegas, Authena AG, a leading provider of NFT ownership certificates and ‘phygital’ authentication at the single SKU level introduced M3TA™, which provides authenticity and ownership certificates via NFTs associated with their physical twin.

The repackaging of pharmaceutical products by parallel importers is a long debated subject. The above question was reconsidered in a set of judgements by the CJEU in November last year (Novartis Pharma GmbH v Abacus Medicine A/S (C 147/20), Bayer Intellectual Property GmbH v kohlpharma GmbH (C 204/20) and Merck Sharp & Dohme BV and others v Abacus Medicine A/S and others (C 147/20)) prompted by a new EU Regulation on the packaging of medicinal products.

Human-centered design is an approach to problem-solving that puts people first. Their needs, their constraints, their contexts and their perspectives. It focuses on users—not necessarily what designers, researchers, or others think users need.

More than 28 billion RAIN RFID chips were deployed in 2021 and it’s expected that the market for these tags will have reached 35 billion by the end of 2022. The majority of these chips are low-cost 3-cent 96-bit RFID “product ID tags” used in supply chain logistics for retailers, performing a similar function as the barcode from the 1970s, but with the benefit that they read through a box at a speed of 1,000 items (tags) per second.

Designed to reduce packaging waste and create a visually stunning consumer experience, the company’s patented, electric luminous film (ELF) can be used in a wide variety of applications, it claims, including several that will be making their American debut at CES.

As we have said before, not all Smart Packaging needs a chip, tag, or QR code to ‘connect’ it, or even something in the material or package to make it ‘active’. In 2020, one example was a box containing a Dutch bike which, on the outside, said it was a television – this reduced damage in transit by 40%! In 2021 we saw a fruit pack that contained a daily banana for six days, from ready to eat to a bit green – which prevents the throwing away of a load of over-ripe bananas. To end 2022, we now have the ‘dissolvable shampoo bottle’, which, in fact, is not a bottle at all.

IQ Structures, a research and production organisation focused on nanotechnology engineering, part of the IQS Group, has introduced holograms for packaging-related security applications that can be authenticated automatically, using normal light and a mobile phone app.

Extended producer responsibility, track and trace, and deposit return schemes will all undoubtedly be key drivers of innovation throughout the next year and beyond. But what role could smart packaging play to facilitate these new technologies?

Labeling is an essential part of packaging for the sale of drugs and medical devices. It provides a product ID, instructions for use and safety information – all of which must remain intact and legible throughout the product’s lifecycle. 

Accord Healthcare, Inc. is voluntarily recalling a single lot of Daptomycin for Injection 500 mg/vial, and Daptomycin for Injection 350 mg/vial product contained in cartons imprinted with lot # R2200232 Exp: 01/2025 to the consumer/user level.

Hospira, Inc., a Pfizer company, is voluntarily recalling one lot of Vancomycin Hydrochloride Injection, USP, 1.5 g/vial Single Dose Fliptop Vial, lot 33045BA, to the user level due to two visible glass particulates observed in a single vial.