Spring is such an opportune time to clean and organize the home, and the medicine cabinet should be no exception. A peek inside my own personal cabinet would tell you that I haven’t done a very good job in organizing items, removing expired medications, and keeping the necessary items I should have on hand, especially with small children. Keeping track of a potentially dangerous area such as this is a crucial part in any home.
Ignoring a cluttered medicine cabinet doesn’t just make for an unorganized space, but it can also cause harm through potential accidental poisonings or not having the right product on hand for whatever health emergency that may arise. With the weather breaking and more time being spent outdoors, it can be helpful to have common remedies in stock and ready to go.
One important task in any home organization project is getting rid of items that aren’t being used. In a medicine cabinet, it is important to look for expired items or those medications that are no longer needed. Clearing these items can not only create space, but also help a scary statistic – each year, roughly 60,000 emergency department visits and 450,000 calls to poison centers involve children under 6 years old who had access to medications and ingested them without their caregiver knowing. Given this statistic, many pharmacies recommend having the nationwide poison control center phone number readily available (1-800-222-1222) either on a cell phone home screen or prominently displayed on refrigerators or medicine cabinets.
Evaluating the type of storage should also be a part of your medicine cabinet spring cleaning. It is important that medications be kept secure and out of children’s reach and in a cool, dry area. Many people choose to keep medicine in a bathroom around a shower area, but the steam from a shower can actually degrade medications.
Disposing Medication
The preferred method of disposing unwanted medication would be to utilize a take-back program often conducted by local law enforcement or community pharmacies. This would be the most environmentally efficient method, as medications taken back this way are often chemically deactivated before disposal and pose the least threat of water and environment contamination.
It is not always easy to find programs such as these. If a take-back site can’t be utilized, medication disposal depends on the type of medication. Most medication can be disposed of by mixing it with an unappealing substance such as dirt, cat litter, or used coffee grounds. The mixture can then be placed in a sealed plastic bag and thrown away in the trash. Be sure to destroy any personal information that may be found on the bottle.
Some at-home drug deactivation systems are now available. A quick Amazon search yields several products that permanently deactivate, destroy, and dispose of medication making it safe for the normal trash and preventing medications from contaminating the environment. I like keeping a pouch on hand for when I spring clean our medicine cabinet, because multiple medications can be dumped in the pouch and deactivated all at once, then placed in the trash.
Many medications are safe to flush down the toilet. The FDA compiles a flush list which can be accessed via their website.
What to Keep Readily Available
Pain-reliever/fever-reducing agent
A commonplace practice for many, including me, is to keep a product such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) or ibuprofen (Motrin) on hand – both in pills and a liquid version for children. Many aches, pains, and fevers arise unexpectedly, and it is helpful to have a product available that can manage these symptoms immediately.
Antihistamine
I also like to keep a bottle of the antihistamine, diphenhydramine (Benedryl), on hand for allergies, rashes, sleep, and motion-sickness. This is an older antihistamine that can help alleviate all of these issues, and it is a practical, efficient item to keep on hand if nothing else is available.
First-aid kit
An up-to-date first-aid kit is also a crucial item to have readily available. Many people like to keep different items in their kits, but at the least all first-aid kits should include bandages (both adhesive and cloth), antiseptic ointment, absorbent compresses, alcohol or antiseptic wipes, hydrocortisone, an oral thermometer, and tweezers.
Dosing cups or syringes
Many children require liquid medication. If you’re like my own mother, you may still prefer to administer medication to children the old-fashioned way on a spoon; however, it is important that an accurate dose be given each and every time.
Your medicine cabinet is one area of your household that should be looked at and organized routinely. If you have any questions at all about medication disposal, your local pharmacy can help. Happy cleaning and best wishes for a great spring!
