Chinese new year house cleaning - don't forget to clean up your medicine cabinet!

To prepare for Chinese New Year, many of us will do some traditional house cleaning. While we are cleaning around the house, we should also remember to clean up our medicine cabinet. Make sure you take a look at the bottles and vials at home and check to see if the expiry date is still good.  As a general precaution, we should not be taking expired medicines, even if the expiry date has just passed recently.

Furthermore, there are specific drugs that require special attention. For

example, eye drops that are opened should not be kept for more than 1 month, even if the expiry date is in the future.    This is to minimize the risk of using a contaminated eye drop and causing eye irritation or infections.

Some patients may have a few capsules or tablets of antibiotics that were left unfinished from a previous treatment. In general, we should complete a full course of antibiotic therapy when prescribed. It is not a good idea to keep the residual antibiotic capsules or tablets for another episode of sickness because of the following two reasons: First of all, the remaining capsules or tablets are not a full course of therapy. Secondly, the new sickness may require a different kind of antibiotics or treatment altogether. Therefore, it is best to seek a doctor’s assessment and obtain a new prescription for the new sickness.

How should we discard expired medicines?

If you have expired medicines at home, please do not throw them in the garbage or in the toilet.  This can contaminate our environment and potentially hurt animals that come in contact with the medicines in the garbage.

Custom Care Pharmacy hires a professional pharmaceutical waste collection and disposal company to properly discard any expired medicines.  

You can bring your expired medicines to Custom Care Pharmacy and we will properly discard them for you, free of charge.

For the new year, we wish everyone good health and good fortune. To maintain your health, it is important to get a yearly check up with your family doctor. There is a saying in English: “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”.  There are many people who will only visit their doctor when they are sick, but in fact, it is more helpful to get a yearly check up and talk to your doctor about preventing sickness.

Dr. Hang Cheng is a family doctor in Markham. He is currently accepting new patients. To book an appointment for a yearly check-up, please call 416-291-0033