It is always important to know how to handle, store, and dispose of your medications.
First, most medications are safe to handle with your bare hands, but there are those medications that require special handling because they may cross over into your system and cause adverse effects. In particular, if you are a care giver of child bearing age who is taking care of a patient who is taking medicine such as oral chemotherapy, gloves may be required when administering. These medications can have harmful effects if they get into your body and you are pregnant. The gloves and medication packaging she be disposed of in a separate bag of that from regular garbage.
There are medications that also require special storage whether it be in a cool place, refrigeration, or non-refrigerated. Almost all pharmacies will place storage stickers on medications that require special storage, but it is always good practice to ask questions when picking up your medications. If you forget to refrigerate a medication for a short period of time, where it is required, it is usually safe under normal circumstances but depending on the medication, it is recommended that you call your pharmacy for verification.
The proper disposal of expired medication or medication that is no longer needed is a frequently asked question. Flushing medication down the toilet used to be recommended for non hazardous medications, but there have been concerns about the amount of prescription medications added to local water supplies.
The FDA has a list of medications that they are continually evaluating as being safe to flush for disposal.
Most medications can be disposed of in your regular household trash using these directions from FDA.gov:
Unused or expired medicines that do not have flushing directions in the label can be disposed of safely in the household trash by:
- Mixing them with something that will hide the medicine or make it unappealing, such as kitty litter or used coffee grounds.
- Placing the mixture in a container such as a sealed plastic bag.
- Throwing the container in your household trash.
Below is some additional information about the disposal of medicine that is no longer needed. If you have additional questions about disposing of your medicine, please contact us at 1-888-INFO-FDA (1-888-463-6332).
****Disclaimer****The information given here is not to replace the medical advice of your personal physician or other healthcare professionals. Our advice is to be used as supplemental information to be reviewed and discussed with your physician or other appropriate medical professional.
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