A Hybrid Framework of Blockchain and IoT Technology in the Pharmaceutical Industry: A Comprehensive Study

Abstract

The pharmaceutical company is key to having a strong healthcare system, and excellent healthcare is essential for every society and economy. However, there are significant concerns with medication safety and security as a result of fake and inferior medical items, which constitute a significant hazard and harm to consumers’ health. Globally, drug counterfeiting is a severe problem that endangers the public’s health as well as the health of consumers. The global business of manufacturing fake medications generates enormous annual revenue. To have a quality healthcare system, the pharmaceutical industry is of great importance and plays a vital role in medicine and pharmaceutical supplies. With emerging computer technologies like blockchain and IoT cutting across several industries and sectors and revolutionizing the world, a systematic literature review of various articles chosen from different databases was carried out in this study to analyze and evaluate application areas of this technology in the pharmaceutical industry and existing frameworks that have been proposed to solve problems faced in the pharmaceutical industry. The outcome of this review showed that the application of the blockchain and IoT hybrid framework can assist in reducing the drug counterfeit problem and provide solutions to most of the problems faced in the pharmaceutical industry. This study also proposed a framework that addressed the drawbacks of existing frameworks in the pharmaceutical industry.