Candy and medicine can look a lot a like, but eating a handful of the wrong one could give you more than a stomach ache. Margaret gets to the bottom of it with pharmacist Alex Luli from the Cleveland Clinic.
Class Discussion Questions:
1) What areas of expertise should a pharmacist have to be successful?
2) Create a medicine safety plan for you home. How will you keep medicine safe from being used inappropriately?
Read the Script:
Is there anything better than stumbling across a candy bowl? This looks like candy, and it smells like candy, but it's actually medicine. And if I take it without following the instructions, I could get really sick. To find out a little bit more, I invited over pharmacist, Alex Luli. First, I started by asking him, what exactly is a pharmacist?
LULI: So a pharmacist does many different things. Most people think traditionally of the pharmacist as the person in the corner drugstore, behind the counter, counting pills, dispensing medications. And that is partially true. But today there's pharmacists that work in all different types of settings. Pharmacists work in the hospital today. They work with physicians and nurses to make sure medications are being used properly and safely. They work for the pharmaceutical industry and help create new drugs. So there's a lot of different things that pharmacists can do today. Some of the things that I do every day are, I make sure patients know how to use their medications properly and safely. I also work with doctors and nurses to hopefully prevent dangerous drug interactions that could be harmful for someone. So there's a few things that I do in addition to dispensing medications.
MARGARET: So when it boils down to it, you're basically a medication expert.
LULI: I would say so, yes.
MARGARET: And so, I've got an assortment of different things on the table here. And some of them are medicine, but some of 'em are candy, and it can be really difficult to tell. So, what exactly is a medication?
LULI: A medication can be really any chemical or compound, that's used to treat or cure, or even prevent, a disease or illness. Most people think of medications as the pills or the tablets, which is what you have here. But medications can come in a lot of different forms, as well. We have liquid medications. We have creams that are medications that you put on your skin. We have patches. There's injectables. So there's a lot of different forms that medications can take.
MARGARET: What are a couple clues that I could look at to figure out what's medication and what's candy?
LULI: Yeah, sot that's a tough one 'cause they do look very similar, as you can see here. One thing that I always look for is that medications, especially medications that come from a pharmacy, usually have a marking on them. So some type of identifiable feature, almost like a fingerprint. It could be a number or a series of letters. And that's a really good way to tell if it's medication versus candy. Also, candy tends to be a little bit more glossy and it looks very appealing, although all this stuff here looks appealing, and I know some of these are medications.
MARGARET: And so one thing that might make it easier is, when it does come in a bottle, if it's not sitting on it's own, we've got things like a cap that's really hard to open, whereas candy normally you can get to it pretty easily.
LULI: Normally in a bag and you can get to it really easily. Absolutely.
MARGARET: And the point of that is so that little kids don't end up--
LULI: Absolutely.
MARGARET: Consuming it.
LULI: Exactly.
MARGARET: And so tell me a little bit more about what's going to be on a container. What does a label tell us?
LULI: A label can tell us a lot of different information. Probably the most important thing is who the medication is intended for. It also tells us what the medication is, the dosage, and then it can have special instructions like when to take the medication, or maybe to take it with or without food, things like that.
MARGARET: And so all of these instructions tell us that it's really important for the medication to be taken by that person with the name on it.
LULI: Absolutely, it's always important for that person to take only that medication that's prescribed for them. So if you ever find a medication that does not have your name on it, it was not intended for you and you should not take it. It could be harmful.
MARGARET: What happens if it's for the wrong person and they take it?
LULI: And there could be issues with that. Medication, as you mentioned, is usually to help people feel better and to get healthy. That's mostly the case. However, they're precisely chosen for that person for a reason, to help them get healthy, and there's a lot of side effects with some of these medications, too. So if someone were to take a medication that wasn't for them, they may have a side effect. We wouldn't know what that's coming from because it was not intended for them.
MARGARET: So it could end up making you sick.
LULI: Very much so, yeah.
MARGARET: And so how can we store medication so that it's not like this? How can we store it in a safe way so that maybe our little siblings don't get into it?
LULI: The best thing to do is always keep it in the original container, and also you wanna keep it out of reach of little kids, maybe little brothers or sisters that are home, or even pets. So, out of reach, usually somewhere high is a good place to keep it. Also, if you have anywhere that has excessive light or moisture, you'd want to check with your pharmacist first before you keep it in that place. It could affect the quality of the medication.
MARGARET: And maybe don't leave it out in bowls like this.
LULI: Absolutely, that's correct.
MARGARET: All right, well, I'll have to take care of this. But, thanks so much for sharing all of your knowledge!
LULI: Thank you.
Learn a little more...with a link!
Website Article: National Institute on Drug Abuse for Teens, Prescription Pain Medications (Opioids) | Get the facts through articles, videos & games.
Online Game, SlideGur, Med Safety Trivia Game | Challenge you & your friends with these facts about prescription drugs.
Video: PBS LearningMedia, Career Connections, Pharmacist | Learn from a pharmacist what this career is like.