Old Prescriptions/meds - What to Do

It may be too late for you to do this but the paperwork they give you along with the bottle has all the same information so you can throw out the bottle and just keep the papers that come with it.

Depending on where you got the prescriptions, some places make it so the labels will just peel right off. Peel them off and throw the bottles in the recycling, don't just throw them away!

If you can't peel the labels, type it all out and scratch out the labels before you recycle them!

Alarming quantities of prescription meds are leaching from treatment plants and septic systems into the groundwater, where eventually livestock, wildlife, and people who drink well water will be exposed to them, so please don't flush. Take the unused prescriptions to your pharmacy and ask them to dispose of them.

You should take any unused meds to a pharmacy, they can dispose of them for you. It isn't safe to flush meds down the drain, it can contaminate our water supply. I like the idea of getting the printout from the pharmacist while you are there, then you can write notes.

Take a black marker and color over the info. then recycle it.

Totally agree with R.M.! Water is precious. The pharmacy will take care of all of it for you.

As for recording - a written ledger is always good, and inexpensive.

I work in a pharmacy and I can tell you that we do not accept peoples expired prescription or over the counter drugs. Can you imagine the amount of medicine that we would have to deal with on a daily basis if we did?
This is what our pharmacists tell customers when they ask about getting rid of unwanted our outdated medicines. Take used coffee grounds and put them into a plastic bag, or some other container, put the medicines in with the coffee grounds and mix them up a little. Now you can dispose of them and no one can get into them and make use of them. This is much better than the old stand by method of flushing them down the toilet, which only dumps them into our sewer system and starts them through a whole new life cycle. You can also dispose of liquid medicines in this same way...just pour them into the coffee grounds ( Or any other moist food garbage) and dispose of. Now there are a few things, such as Fentanyl Patches or Lidoderm Patches which require special handling but that should have instructions on the packaging and you should have been counseled about it by your pharmacist.
As to the information on the label, I Would simply pull it off of the bottle and destroy it. Your pharmacist should have a complete record of every prescription you have purchased and can advise you as to side effects.
This is one more reason to always try and purchase your prescriptions through one pharmacy, so they have a complete record of everything your family takes and can check for interactions.

Your pharmacy can give you a print out of the meds you all were on, and all the info that goes along with it. And then I would flush any unused meds, and burn the bottles with the labels or peel the labels off and toss the bottles.

As a pharmacist, I want to reiterate that you do not want to flush your medications. It used to be our recommendation, but it is no longer. The treatments do not get rid of everything. This comes from a 2009 article in Parade magazine:

"In 2002, the U.S. Geological Survey announced that tests of 139 streams in 30 states showed trace amounts of common pharmaceuticals like Prozac, codeine, antibiotics, and drugs for high blood pressure and diabetes. The Environmental Protection Agency so far has found no immediate risk to humans but suspects that drug contamination is causing ecological harm. "

So though it may not affect your drinking water in a harmful way, it is affecting the environment. The suggestion of a previous poster to mix it in coffee grounds (or kitty litter as another alternative) is the way to go.

As several posters have mentioned, you can easily get a record of everything you were on from your pharmacist. If there was a particular reaction to a medication, document it and be sure the doctor is aware as well, they will put it in your chart so they know not to prescribe it again.

I hold on to the paperwork that came with them, as it has all the information about who and what and what age on it. The bottles I toss. Unless it's Zofran, then I refill and keep and use.

Some cities have medication recycling programs where you can take your old meds to a drop site for them to dispose of.

If you have a copier, copy the labels and print them out. Mark through the label on the bottle with permanent market and through the bottle away.

I normally carefully pull the labels off, and then, if you want to keep them for your records ,put the labels directly on a piece of paper that you'll keep in a file/notebook (Medical Info) and add any missing info that may not be on the label: re: the date of an upcoming refill, why you may have taken it,etc. And I keep the receipt info in another folder (Medical Expenses) for Tax Purposes , Medical Expense Acct, etc. It makes things easy to find and keep track of. Hope this was helpful ! :) C. S.

The bottles I get usually have the info on a sticker. Does yours not have it? Also if you can't tear the label off you can always write the information down in a little memo book and put it in your medicine cabinet and scratch out the info on the bottle or black it out. This way you know what reaction you had with what meds, what worked and what didn't according to your notes.

I am also a pharmacist.
The best recommendation is to use a "single" pharmacy for you and your family. They keep the records for you and will give you advice regarding your meds, side effects, etc. You can keep your own record, but remember, a pharmacist will have the latest information about medications.

Type all of the info into a spreadsheet on your computer then shred or magic marker the labels before you throw the bottles away. If there are any pills, you should hide them with food you are throwing away if you don't want to flush them. I sometimes clean the bottles thoroughly, black out the labels, and reuse them. They work great for glitter and beads because the kids can't get into them to make a mess. My uncle actually works in a waste water treatment plant. He said they clean out everything that gets flushed, things that might dissolve like liquids or pills get cleaned out when the water gets put through filters and chemicals before finally coming out of the plant. The concern in flushing medicine is more for people who don't use city water, like my parents.