Opportunities in drug RFID and smart packaging

Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a rapidly growing business, with some estimates predicting $2.1 billion global turnover by 2016. Smart packaging for health care has additional potential value, for example, in patient compliance recording blister packs that track when each pill is removed from the packaging.

Among the benefits recognized for RFID and smart packaging are marketing advantages: the drug industry estimates that $8.0 billion per year in potential revenue is lost through unfilled new and refill prescriptions. According to a survey carried out on behalf of MeadWestvaco, a USA-based packaging firm, 30%-50% of prescribed drugs are taken incorrectly. Many patients do not get refills where prescribed and over a quarter of over-45s in the USA admit to discontinuing the prescribed medication prematurely which, apart from potentially harming the patient's health, can lead to the development of resistant strains of viruses, where antivirals are misused in this way.

Compliance through packaging, for example, by having smart packs that have alarms that trigger when the time for the next dosage is due, are intended to "enroll the patient in their own care," although such systems seem as likely to antagonize patients as help them.