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EPCglobal, a joint venture between GS1 (formerly EAN International) and GS1 US (formerly the Uniform Code Council, UCC), is leading the development of industry-driven standards for the Electronic Product Code™ (EPC) to support the use of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) in today’s fast-moving, information rich trading networks. EPCglobal is a member-driven, not for profit, organisation comprised of leading firms and industries focused on creating global standards for the EPCglobal Network™. The objective is increased visibility and efficiency throughout the supply chain and higher quality information flow between trading communities. See EPCglobal website.
EPC is the combination of Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID), and Network facilities to give global access to information related to single objects as they move up and down the supply chain. These enable the tracking and tracing of individual items offering a host of benefits across multiple industries.
The adoption of EPC in Healthcare offers many opportunities for improved patient safety, product safety and supply chain efficiency.
EPC has been adopted by the FDA in the US as the right way to combat counterfeit pharmaceuticals and possibly other Healthcare products. This view is supported by the US industry group The Product Safety Task Force – see PSTF White paper dated 13th July 2004 [256 KB]
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Ensuring the developing EPC standards meet the needs of the European Healthcare industry is a key issue and one that the European Healthcare Initiative is actively addressing. On 21st/22nd October in Brussels, the European Healthcare Initiative is hosting an action-oriented workshop on EPC in Healthcare, with the objectives to deliver information to European pharmaceutical and medical devices companies and to establish work groups that can actively address key issues.