Managing Meds with Mom

Mom marks the "twice a day" pills to make it easier to fill her pill boxes

My mom has the engineer’s mind in our family, so I always pay attention to the solutions she creates.

On a recent visit she showed me how she makes it easier to manage her medications.  She uses a different size pill box for the morning meds and the evening meds.  This allows her to see at a glance which pill box is for which time of day.  Also, she marks the bottles of the pills she takes twice per day to make it easier to remember which ones to put in both boxes.

There are many ways to help manage medications, and many things to consider.  Mom’s method works great for her now, but might be dangerous if she put the marked tops on the wrong bottles!  And if she didn’t automatically remember whether the morning pill box was the big one or the small one, she could end up taking a sleeping pill in the morning, for example.

Morning pills in one sized box; evening pills in a different sized box

There are many devices to help organize pills, including a machine that dispenses pills at the right time of day and calls the caregiver if the dose is not removed from the device.  Some pharmacies will even pack doses of pills together in blister packs.  The important thing is to consider what will make sense to your elderly parent, given their particular situation.

For more ideas, talk to your local pharmacist, and review these articles.  To learn more about my own parents, read “Digging Ditches with Dad” and “The Art of Making a Personal Connection.”

Know someone who worries about their elderly parent in Charlottesville, Staunton, or Harrisonburg Virginia? Care is There Geriatric Care Management can help! Have them contact me, Elizabeth, for a free consultation: 434.326.5323ext 2 or Elizabeth@careisthere.com.

For more information about our services, and to read testimonials from our clients, visit our website. Also, view this short video about our care management services.

Elizabeth Swider, Certified Senior Advisor and Certified Aging in Place Specialist
President, Care is There Geriatric Care Management

Support for independent living and long distance caregiving; assisted living enhancement