A UTTOXETER pharmacy has spoken about the ‘phenomenal’ amount of medicines it sees returned as new figures reveal that wasted medicines cost the NHS more than £5 million in South Staffordshire last year.
South Staffordshire PCT, which covers Uttoxeter, say that money could have been used for 120 more community nurses, 560 more heart bypass operations or 800 more hip replacements.
It has now launched a campaign to promote how much medicine is wasted each year and the Advertiser spoke to the town’s Co-op Pharmacy about the issue.
Pharmacist at the Market Place branch Stephen Orme said: “Members of the public may return medicines to any pharmacy — it does not have to be the place you originally went to with your prescription.
“People may return drugs because the drugs have caused side effects, or there may have been no side effects but no positive effects either, i.e. it has been ineffective, or sadly, sometimes the person has passed away.
“People sometimes complain that the doctor will only prescribe one month’s supply of their medication at a time.
“This is an attempt to reduce the amount of unwanted medication that is returned to us. If a medicine is not suitable, at least there is only one box to throw away rather than two, three, or more.
“The bins I am pictured with were emptied at the start of November and are full already, so this shows how much medication is returned to us.
“To be fair, we do use the dustbins to dispose of our own medicines that go out of date, so there is some of our own waste in there but even so, it does show the phenomenal amount of medicines returned in just two months.
“Whenever someone returns medicines to a pharmacy, we have to dispose of them into these dustbins.
“People often think that unopened medicines can be put back on the shelf and re-used but this cannot be done for hygiene reasons.
“Some people think that old medicines are sent to third world countries — this is not true either.
The reality is that when full, the dustbins are collected and incinerated.” This month the pharmacy is handing out leaflets with the prescriptions it dispenses and the PCT is running a competition to run alongside the promotion.
Mr Orme added: “Many people when ordering their prescriptions just tick everything on their repeat slip, so the message of this campaign is to only order what you need.
“Many people do not remember which drug is for what, so order everything. Pharmacists will be only too happy to sit down and talk in private to anyone wanting more information about what their medicines are for and how to use them to help them order the correct ones.”
