Effective immediately, HealthPRO will align with language used by GS1 Canada and will refer to the innermost packaging that comes into direct contact with medication (i.e. tablet, solution, or powder for injection, etc.) as primary packaging.

Previously, HealthPRO used the term unit-of-use to refer to this level of packaging.

“Ensuring the use of standardized language across the industry will help streamline our collaborative efforts to ensure GS1 barcodes appear on all levels of packaging,” notes
Tracy Gallina, Pharmacy Clinical Director at HealthPRO.

For reference, secondary packaging is the layer of packaging surrounding the primary package. It may be used for the purpose of presentation and branding or for additional mechanical protection that the primary package might not be able to provide. The secondary package may contain one or more primary packages.