Evaluation of RFID Performance for a Pharmaceutical Distribution Chain: HF vs. UHF

In this paper, we investigate and compare the use of passive HF and UHF RFID systems for the item level identification of pharmaceutical products throughout their supply chains. We compare the overall identification performances of both types of RFID systems on individual products and on totes filled with tagged products. Scenarios representative of all aspects of the pharmaceutical distribution chain from the manufacturer to the retailer are considered. We conclude that the tested passive UHF RFID system provides significantly superior identification performance than do passive HF RFID systems.