Breast implants receive barcodes in a bid to increase patient safety
Breast implants and other medical items are set to receive barcodes due to a new initiative by the Department of Health.
The initiative aims to improve patient safety and avoid future scandals like the Poly Implant Prothèse (PIP) breast implant scare of 2010 that involved faulty silicone implants.
The new system is intended to record each medicine and implant given to patients by scanning the product packet and the patient’s identity wristband.
Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said, “This can actually save lives for the NHS; we have had a number of operations where the wrong implant is put into someone’s body and then that has to be changed at a later date. If we use modern barcode technology, we can deal with a lot of these problems.”
With this new system, medical sta in England will be able to use the barcodes for stocktaking and to see if any batches of medicine are reaching their use-by dates. In addition, surgeons will be able to monitor whether one type of implant is outperforming another in terms of wear and tear.
