Pharmaceutical labels for medicines and medical devices

Medical and pharmaceutical labels for secure product identification

Pharmaceutical labels ensure that essential information on pharmaceutical products, such as medicines and medical devices, is clearly visible: active ingredient details, dosage, barcodes, instructions for use, batch numbers and expiry dates. Whether blank or pre-printed, using multi-colour flexographic printing or cost-effective digital printing: we ensure this information remains clearly legible and machine-readable on every type of pharmaceutical packaging, from folding cartons to small vials.

Permanently adhesive pharmaceutical labels for demanding conditions

The requirements for adhesion and durability of self-adhesive labels in the pharmaceutical industry and medical applications often go far beyond those of normal storage conditions. Labels must adhere securely in the cold chain and on frozen surfaces, withstand moisture and condensation, and must not peel off even during pasteurisation, steam sterilisation or autoclaving. Added to this are curved containers such as vials, ampoules and glass tubes, which require a particularly flexible and strongly adhesive combination of materials. From a wide range of adhesive materials produced in-house, we work with you to select the right combination of pressure-sensitive adhesive and face material for your self-adhesive labels, ensuring that the labelling remains intact from production through to storage and final use.

Tamper-evident closures and first-opening protection for medicinal products

Sealing labels and tamper evident labels are labelling solutions that fulfil key security functions for medicinal products: they serve as tamper-evident closures and provide proof of first opening; as seals, they offer reliable protection against tampering; and they can carry additional product information. For prescription medicines, such tamper-evident protection has been mandatory since the EU Falsified Medicines Directive came into force. The labels must adhere securely yet still be easy to open. Often, they need to be re-applied multiple times to securely seal the medicine. Corner bonds, circular bonds and curved, uneven surfaces place particular demands on the label and adhesive. In such cases, labels with particularly strong adhesion and high flexibility are required, for example for secure circular labelling on glass tubes, vials and ampoules.

Serialisation, track and trace, and UDI for medicines and medical devices

Since February 2019, every pharmaceutical package containing a prescription-only medicine in the EU must bear a unique, individual serial number. We support you with labels for serialisation in the pharmaceutical industry, which offer greater flexibility than direct printing onto the folding carton, particularly where the cardboard material or surface finish makes printing difficult. For medical devices, UDI labelling on medical labels forms the basis of traceability: product and production data such as the GTIN, batch number and expiry date are combined in a machine-readable 2D barcode, supplemented by a plain-text line. Together with tamper-evident labels for first-opening protection, this creates end-to-end protection – from counterfeit protection and evidence of tampering to seamless batch traceability – thereby ensuring the highest level of safety for patients and manufacturers.

Documentation labels – labels with a wide range of functions

Multi-layer label materials and custom die-cuts make it possible to peel off parts of the label after the base label has been applied and re-apply them elsewhere. Such documentation labels are used, for example, in patient records, vaccination cards or batch documentation, and ensure the unambiguous allocation of product, patient and application. Patient labels for use in hospitals – whether blank or pre-printed, and with custom die-cuts – are also one of our areas of expertise.

Wrap-around labels make it possible to dispense with package inserts and folding cartons

In the pharmaceutical sector, wrap-around labels make a decisive contribution to minimising packaging, ensuring the placement of statutory labelling and avoiding packaging waste, which is also of great importance in the pharmaceutical industry in light of the PPWR. By incorporating multilingual text onto the wrap-around label, which is wrapped directly around the pharmaceutical container, it is often possible to dispense with separate package inserts or secondary packaging, thereby significantly reducing packaging costs. Find out more about the advantages of wrap-around labels