SLAM Solutions in the Pharmaceutical Industry
An area of high scrutiny, pharmaceuticals benefit from automate SLAM equipment.
One of the most regulated industries in the country is Pharmaceuticals. Any warehouse that handles them must be aware of exactly what those regulations are and how to meet them, from receiving to shipping. There are many checks that involve tracking and tracing, especially with prescriptions—the name of the game is getting the right medications to the right patients.
Generally, pharmaceutical orders go from in-store pharmacies to central filling locations, each of which serves multiple locations. This is where track and trace come into the picture, and every step of the process needs to be making those critical checks. The more automated your warehouse, the less likely you’ll experience human-caused errors.
One big piece of this automated picture is the final 100 feet of your operations—scan, label, apply and manifest (SLAM). If you’ve got a fully automated SLAM arena, you’ll have much lower incidence of errors in the shipping process. For instance, if you are manually dropping medications into an envelope and placing instructions with them, then adding a label with a tracking number, you will face higher odds of error.
If you use automated equipment to manage all of that, the likelihood of error goes way down. The shipping label automatically placed on the outside would verify the item is headed to the right location. Or, when placing the medication bottle into the bag for shipping, you scan the label on it to verify the size of the bottle, the type of medication, and then verify the information in your software system. On the way out, there’s an additional check via a label scan.
SLAM is helpful beyond verification when it comes to shipping pharmaceuticals. It is also a productivity enhancer. Take a large 3PL, for example, who handles wellness products for an ecommerce brand. In these cases, the 3PL will be managing hundreds of eaches and compiling orders for direct-to-consumer delivery. When those eaches or orders of several items reach the SLAM line, it can keep the shipping processes moving at a productive pace. Often, this pace is much higher than when humans are handling each product, placing it in bags or cartons, sealing them, and then applying the labels.
Another bonus of SLAM equipment when it comes to the pharmaceutical industry is sustainability. By incorporating right-sized packaging on your SLAM line, you’ll eliminate waste. Automation will ensure that one pill bottle will go out in a small-sized bag or box, not something overly large and full of unnecessary fill. Or the SLAM line can select a paper bag instead of plastic before inserting the bottle into a small box or carton for shipping.
If you already have warehousing software in place, adding SLAM automation isn’t a big leap, nor is it expensive when you consider the rapid ROI that accompanies it. This is especially true with high-value items like pharmaceuticals.
To learn more about MHI’s SLAM industry group: www.mhi.org/slam
More information about Scanning, Labeling, Applying, Manifesting:
Order Personalization with SLAM
How SLAM Can Help with Returns
How SLAM Helps Get the Order Right
Using Peak Season for Next Season
Podcast: Elevating Order Fulfillment: VRCs & SLAM Efficiency in the Modern Warehouse
