So, for today's post I'm going to stick with discussing medications.
When you go to the doctor to verify medications there is actually more than either "yes or no" if you are taking something. Now, all EMR (electronic medical records) systems are different so this might not be true for all places; but either way your doctors office should know this information
When I open your medication list it has the medication and 4 boxes next to it. One of them have to be checked next to each med. The boxes are labeled T, N, U, D. The T stands for taking, the N stands for not taking, the U stands for unknown, the D stands for discontinued.
TAKING- this means you are taking the medication as prescribed on the bottle. If you have a Rx for Ambien or Xanax 90% of the time it will say take "blah blah blah" as needed or prn. If you only need this medication once every 6 months and you still have the bottle in your home, it is considered Taking. We will generally make a comment in the nurses section that you take it rarely if that's the case.
NOT TAKING- This is where some folks might not understand this option. There are some of you that if you are given a prescription for pain medication after a surgery and it says "take 1 every 6 hours as needed for 10 days" at the end of 10 days if there is anything left you discard it. Well, more often than not, people keep that medication on hand (I'm not saying there is anything wrong with that!) So when I ask if you are still taking Hydrocodone, your automatic answer may be to say "no" But if you still have it in your home I need to know that and mark that medication as Not Taking.
UNKNOWN- the patient simply can't remember even with helping try to remind them what the medication is taken for, who gave it, when...
DISCONTINUED- the medication is not in your home at all.
Why we need to know such specifics is for a few different reasons
>If a patient has addiction problems, suicidal thoughts, memory issues we know what drugs they have at their disposal.
>If a patient comes in with an injury and they tell us they took one of their old pain meds from hip surgery 2 years ago, we know what that medication was
>If a patient comes in sick and they say they took some antibiotic that they had left over from last year we know what antibiotic that is (they are not all treated the same)
>If a patient comes in with their elderly mother and are in a complete panic because she went into the medicine cabinet and took some medicine and nobody know what because she can't find the bottles and she is now lethargic. We can look at your chart and know what all you have in your home and can decide if there is a major problem.
So, if you are hanging on to that antibiotic or pain med. Let us know! Yes, your doctor will probably tell you to get rid of them. However, you are a grown up and can tell them "no" I want to keep it for emergencies. This way if anything bad happens we have all the information.
Thanks for reading
Good night