What Is Medication Management and Is It Right for You?
Have you ever forgotten to take your medication?
It’s an easy mistake, and it has likely happened to us all at some point in our lives.
For seniors facing serious health challenges, a missed dose can have serious consequences. We’d like to examine what is medication management and how it can minimize the likelihood of missing a vital dosage.
What Is Medication Management?
Medication management is the process of examining all your medications—past and present—to make informed decisions about your care. This may involve reviewing the effectiveness of your prescriptions, ensuring there are no interactions and recording your prescribing history.
What is medication management? You’ll find that it involves several facets. These include:
Reconciling medications.
This examines and reviews all medicines you’re currently taking to safeguard against incorrect dosages and interactions.
Maintaining an accurate medication history
By carefully recording your history, it can help monitor whether or not you’ve had a bad reaction to a drug in the past. This also involves taking a look at any over-the-counter medicines you’ve taken. One of the advantages of ensuring an accurate history is that it also evaluates the effectiveness of the medication. This prevents you from being “re-prescribed” something that did not work.
Preventing Omissions
Did you know that 20 percent of older Americans take 10 or more medications? Almost half—40 percent—regularly take five or more. When you add in over-the-counter medicines and supplements, the figure climbs even higher.
Is it any wonder that it’s easy to lose track of when to take so many pills?
Our team understands and works with you to not only ensure nothing is forgotten, but to also help you understand the principles behind what is medication management.
What Is Medication Management and Is It Right for You?
If you are on several medications—a practice called polypharmacy—there are several advantages to medication management. A solid mediation management strategy is also something you should consider when searching for a skilled nursing facility in Greenville.
Of course, you should speak with your doctor and health care team before you make important decisions regarding your treatment. However, we believe if you meet any of the following criteria, you would greatly benefit from medication management:
- You are on multiple medications —especially if you’re on five or more
- You have had bad reactions to medications in the past. One of the benefits of medication management is it ensures you won’t be placed on medicines that have not been successful in the past.
- You have multiple health conditions—particularly if those are chronic, such as diabetes, COPD or high cholesterol. Several medications are used to manage these, and it helps to have a health care team evaluate them.
- You take medications that require close monitoring
- You have been hospitalized—medication management ensures that your plan of care from your hospital discharge is followed.
What Is Medication Management? It’s Another Way We Serve You at East Carolina Rehabilitation and Wellness
When you or your loved one is taking several different medications, it can become difficult to keep up with your doctor’s plan of care.
If you’re caring for someone, laying out their medications, getting refills, and ensuring they get the right dosage can be stressful and time-consuming.
Skilled nursing gives you the peace of mind knowing that your loved one’s needs are being met—and our medication management provides an enhanced level of service and safety. This is particularly important if your loved one is struggling with the aftermath of an injury, heart attack, or stroke.
Are you ready to take the next step? Contact us for more information and a tour. We’ll be glad to show you what makes East Carolina Rehabilitation and Wellness special.