Medication Clutter: How to Dispose of Expired Prescriptions
Most people have old, expired medication in a bathroom, kitchen or mixed in with toiletries. For the safety of children and pets, it is important not to have old medicine lying around--not to mention the extra clutter it causes. Medications also lose their effectiveness, and may even have the opposite effect becoming harmful once expired.Throwing medication into the garbage is not a good option because it can actually get into our soil this way. Flushing medicine, or dumping it down the drain is also hazardous. In fact, traces of certain medications have actually been found in water supplies. Here is how to properly dispose of old medications:
- Check your local village to see what they offer. Make sure when you bring any medication to public disposal that your personal information is removed from the container.
- Go to the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) website's Public Disposal Location page. Put your zip code in and a list of authorized collection locations will populate.
- Corral medications into a safe place and bring them in during the next National Prescription Drug Take Back Day.
Keeping medications and prescriptions optimally organized also means setting aside time once or twice per year to go through what you have, making sure nothing is expired or out of date. Of course, it's another project that our Chaos To Order organizers are happy to help with! :-)