Unwanted meds

[Gadget]

So what do you all do with your unwanted meds. All the time I'm reading something like "oh, I was on this for two days and hated it so I stopped cold turkey.". What do you do with the leftovers?

Do you do the safe turn in that I think the fire dept or EMS does every now and then? I know you shouldn't flush them.

[celldweller]

I used to work at a pharmacy. Whenever drugs would expire, we would simply throw them in the trash. So that is what I do to this day. Maybe not the best way to go about it...

[royce]

Turn them into who and why?

Make sure you cover you own butt!

**Dump them in some kitty litter if you are absolutely against flushing them. Add some liquid with them like wat3er and a fat. That helps destroy them.

This does not deactivate the drugs, but may help you.

If you cannot or will dispose of them by yourself, you probably could ask a medical professional to help. If I was not able to do it myselp, I probably would ask family member to do it with me.

[Swizzlestick]

So what do you all do with your unwanted meds. All the time I'm reading something like "oh, I was on this for two days and hated it so I stopped cold turkey.". What do you do with the leftovers?

Do you do the safe turn in that I think the fire dept or EMS does every now and then? I know you should flush them.

I was told to throw them in trash but not in the bottle. So, if someone was scrounging in garbage for them, they would have to dig for individual pills.

My Suboxone Dr. told me (and I am not BS'ing) that anyone willing to dig through trash for individual pills has really earned them as thus should be able to have them.

JMHO

~ Swizzle

[UGAgal]

I would give them to your pharmacist to dispose of if it were me.

[royce]

Pharmacists can be jerks too. If you give it to one, the should dispose of it in front of you, or another medical prof. Cover your butt, please.

[datlas]

Just dump them in a public trash can and wipe your prints

[Lynx4]

Why would someone need to cover their butt when disposing of meds? Take them out of the bottle and stick them in some coffee grinds or cat litter.

In my area they have a disposable system. You go to the pharmacy and pay $3 to get this little baggy. You put the meds in them and I think they are sent off to be incinerated. I haven't done it myself but the display is at all the local pharmacies. I don't throw out anything that someone would want so I don't worry about it. I don't put any medicine in our water system as we have already messed up the water so bad that boys may be girls in 70 or 80 years lol! (the articles are scary but the sheer amount of female hormones in the water supply is causing females to go through puberty at young ages and when they test the water they always find opiates and benzos in trace amounts). I figure putting them in the landfill is the lesser of two evils.

[dannyy]

I just chuck mine like any old rubbish since I don't throw any good drugs anyway so anyone rooting around for them will be severely disappointed.

[alumni]

Pharmacists can be jerks too. If you give it to one, the should dispose of it in front of you, or another medical prof. Cover your butt, please.

That's just silly to ask a pharmacist to let you watch while the drugs are disposed of. Whose "butt" are you covering with that advice and why would a customer care how the drugs were destroyed?
When you were supposedly a pharmacist, did you have any customers who wanted to watch you dispose of unwanted medicine?

[taralumia]

Well @royce is kind of right on this one. No professional should ever accept drugs from a client without the presence of another professional. I don't think we need to go so far as to watch the actual disposal part, though. I'd think it's the pharmacist whose butt needs covering.
If there isn't a take-back program in your area, you could check the DEA's program; Drug Disposal.

[VictoriaIvy]

Hate to say it but if they are good, I save them for a friend. There have been time when a friend of my died, and I was a reck..... A good friend gave me some of her xanax, so when she threw out her back and I had a whole bottle of muscle relaxers I didn't like and she said she like them, I said they are all yours.

[peacefulfeeling]

After my uncle passed away, I was tasked with cleaning and clearing up his belongings. Among his possessions was a HUGE and I mean huge stock of pain meds as well as quite a few rec items. I really wasn't thinking it through so I flushed all of it. Looking back, I could have made a fortune!

[j2thalea]

Hahaha I have been wondering this question for SOME time. I still have all my old meds just sitting in the medicine cabinet. =-O Some of them are over TEN years old LOL... ^_^

[royce]

I take the easiest and the safest route.

I also do not invovle other unless necessary. I do it myself.

I need to do stuff that way.

**We, too, were cleaning after grandparents passing and found unbelievable stuff, money, a birth certificate that indicated we had been using an incorrect name for them/us.

The cemetary informed us there were remains in a family plot for an infant nobody ever bothered to mentioned, ever. I have first cousins that to this day cannot find out the health of a parent/grandparent. Sounds like another thread.....

Amazing how some people lived.

[alumni]

I take the easiest and the safest route.

I also do not invovle other unless necessary. I do it myself.

I need to do stuff that way.

So when you were a "pharmacist" did you require your customers to personally watch you dispose of their unwanted prescription medicine?
Was that advice back then the easiest and safest route to cover your butt?
Currently, CVS has a program to allow its customers to bring in their unwanted leftovers but I've not seen anyone standing around at the counter watching the pharmacist put them in the disposal container.

[redman]

I dont throw most medicine away ecspecially pain pills. I find that they are still potent years after the listed experation date. You just never know when you might need them. With the way doctors are today about dolling out pain meds it would be best to have some reserves.

[royce]

My employers always had protocol for doing this. My thought were never considered, at least by my employer.

***When I dispose of meds, I take the path of least resistance for me anyway. I do it privately, safely, and quickly.

[cherrybomb]

If i have unwanted meds that i've been prescribed that didn't work for me--such as paxil, zoloft, whatever--i bring them into my psych doctor so she can give them to other patients that don't have money--especially sample packs.

No sense in wasting if someone else can use them.

For pain meds i just keep them. Someone can always use it at some point (usually me! lol)

Cheers

[royce]

I may have confused again. I CYA (cma) all the time. I have to follow protocol, law too. I have to keep an animal around me all the time safe also.

Kids/grandkids to not usually show up when/where we work. But safety is alsways an issue.

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Actually flushing is a suggested route in the literature (in this case, from the pharmacy and manufacturer to dispose of one of my necessary pain meds when I finish it.)