The Lebanese-American University School of Pharmacy in Byblos, Lebanon, has become the first blockchain node on foreign soil of what is now an international consortium of prescription repositories, health care organizations and higher education institutions to reclaim medications and track prescription waste - and in doing so eliminate the financial, environmental and accessibility problems it causes.

The network, established by Good Shepherd Pharmacy in Memphis, utilizes RemediChain's blockchain technology to track this waste across the United States and - now - the globe.

"The consortium is already saving lives by decreasing the amount of high-value medication that is wasted and instead putting it in the hands of patients in need," said Bedie Moran, chief strategy officer at RemediChain. "But the data is also priceless. We've never before been able to track prescription waste across state lines, much less in multiple countries. It presents an opportunity to radically improve health care globally by identifying where - and more importantly why - the medication isn't reaching the patients who really need it. Once we know that, we can begin to address the problems."

"In the United States, medication is often wasted because someone passes away before they take their prescription or their treatment plan changes," Moran said. "But there are plenty of reasons for waste, which include ripple effects from counterfeit medications, corruption, or even crime in removing the drugs from the supply chain. Any or all of those things are in play globally. If we can identify where the waste is and why, we can work toward stopping it and putting the medication where it belongs."

Since October 2018, the RemediChain platform has received more than $2.2 million worth of donated high-value oral chemotherapy medication, some of which has already been verified and dispensed to patients with demonstrated financial need, including Tennessee.