European Healthcare Initiative Launch
GS1 (formerly EAN International) in Europe Launches New Initiative in the Healthcare Market
- the ‘European Healthcare Initiative’ aims to reduce risk through certainty in European hospital supply chains
Brussels, February 2003
The European organisations of GS1 (formerly EAN International) have launched a new, high profile initiative, the European Healthcare Initiative, to significantly increase adoption of GS1 standards – the GS1 System – in the healthcare market across Europe. Primarily concentrating on the supply chains to hospitals and community pharmacies, GS1 is convinced that the wide-spread adoption of their global standards of identification, bar coding and electronic commerce messaging in the European healthcare market, can significantly cut supply chain costs, reduce risk to patients and help improve patient care.
GS1’s System already has a significant user base in the medical devices and pharmaceuticals supply chains in Europe. The system has been used for many years by major companies like Mathys, Pfizer and B. Braun Medical bringing huge business benefits. With the European Healthcare Initiative, GS1 is now intent on rapidly developing this user community.
Robert Schubenel, former CEO of GS1 Switzerland and member of the European Healthcare Initiative Supervisory Board, explained: “Never before have we seen a business climate in healthcare where there is such a common and determined drive to increase process efficiencies and improve patient care and safety as today – right across Europe. More and more major organisations – companies and trade associations alike - are seeking ways to modernise the hospital supply chains, from manufacturer to patient, by introducing process automation: of product identification, of information collection through barcoding and scanning techniques, and of electronic information exchange between customers and suppliers. The EAN.UCC System, with its global community of almost one million user companies and multi-sector applicability, has a proven track record not least in healthcare, and is a fundamental building block of this process improvement. We are convinced that the time is right to drive out even greater adoption in healthcare through our initiative for the benefit of all parties”.
The EAN.UCC system is a continually developing set of standards that enables the efficient management of global, multi-industry supply chains by uniquely identifying products, shipping units, assets, locations and services. It facilitates electronic commerce processes including full tracking and traceability. In short, the EAN.UCC System brings speed and certainty of information flow and, with it, reduced risk to the supply chain and to the patient.
The EAN.UCC is uniquely suited to meeting the requirements of the healthcare industry – for tracking and tracing of healthcare products, medical devices and pharmaceuticals alike, for better inventory management, reduced patient and supply chain risk and improved product recall processes. Accordingly the healthcare market globally is increasingly adopting the EAN.UCC System and as such it is rapidly becoming the de facto standard. For example, Pfizer, one of the largest drug manufacturers in the world, has adopted the standard for single dose identification; the Japanese healthcare industry, the second largest in the world, has adopted it as standard as has the State of New South Wales in Australia. In Switzerland, following the introduction of improved narcotic controls in 1996, the new billing system with health insurance companies is based on the EAN.UCC System. In Spain the largest public hospitals use the EAN.UCC System for their stock management; and in the UK, the British Healthcare Trades Association, a major representative of the medical devices industry, has recently announced its adoption of the system, industry-wide.
Jim Bracken, Director of GS1 Ireland and Chairman of the initiative’s Supervisory Board concluded “We have established a central European Team which will drive the initiative forward, working closely with our network of European Member Organisations, each with their own healthcare experts, as well as GS1 headquarters based in Brussels. We have already started discussions with many organisations around Europe and our aim is to work closely with them all to help with their modernisation programmes. As such, I firmly believe 2003 will mark a watershed in the development and improvement of European hospital supply chains – for the benefit of all.”
Notes for the Editor:
GS1 (formerly EAN International)
The mission of GS1 and the Membership Organisations, is to take a leading role in establishing a global multi-industry system of identification and communication for products, services and locations based on internationally accepted and business led standards.
The objective is to improve the efficiency of integrated logistics while contributing added value to partners involved, as well as to consumers.
GS1 is a global organisation of over 100 independent national bodies -the Member Organisations - representing 145 countries. They support the needs of nearly one million member companies who conduct more than 5 billion transactions per day in 23 sectors of industry (including healthcare) using the standards.
For more information
For more information contact:
Mr Christian Hay (Switzerland) on +41 76 369 10 54 or email: hay@gs1health.net
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