What is the difference between Verification and Decommissioning ?

Verification

Verification is a process that can take place at any time during movement of the medicine through the supply chain. It checks the Unique Identifier of the product against data held in the national repository to verify that the product is authentic and is available for supply to the patient.

Decommissioning

Decommissioning is two processes in one – first a Pack Verification is performed and if successful, then a Pack Decommission is performed, which marks the Pack as Supplied in the system.

Decommissioning changes the Status of the Pack, usually from Active to Supplied, which means the Pack has been Dispensed.

There are other Decommissioned States such as Exported, Sampled, Free Sampled, Locked, Destroyed and Stolen. Destroyed and Stolen are terminal states meaning they cannot be reversed.

When a Pack is in a Decommissioned State, it cannot be further decommissioned and will generate an Alert is a decommission transaction is attempted.