There are two methods for scanning and decommissioning medicines, these are:

Scanning each medicine pack individually - Individual packs of medicines can be decommissioned at the point of supply to the patient, however this can raise issues of patient confidentiality if the scan is completed at the medicines counter and also impact patient confidence in the medicine if the scan generates a red or amber alert.

Use of aggregated codes - aggregated codes can be used to collate the data from the UI of each pack of medicine into a single code. This aggregated code can be incorporated into the address label attached to the outside of the medicines bag allowing a single code to be scanned at the point of supply. Use of an aggregated code provides an easier and timelier method of decommissioning multiple packs of medicines.