"This is poison. Poison" Expiration Date: Can I just take it?

YTN Radio (FM 94.5) [YTN News FM Wise Radio Life]
□ Broadcast Date: November 21, 2024 (Thursday)
□ Host: Announcer Park Gui-bin
□ Castor: Do Won-im, Ministry of Food and Drug Safety Researcher

* The text below may differ from the actual broadcast content, so please check the broadcast for more accurate information.
◆ Announcer Park Gui-bin (hereinafter referred to as Park Gui-bin): It's a life white paper time with the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety. Next year, Korea will also enter a super-aged society. According to recent statistics, the elderly in Korea have an average of 2.2 chronic diseases and 13.9% of the elderly without chronic diseases. In other words, most of the elderly have chronic diseases such as high blood pressure and diabetes, and use drugs to manage chronic diseases. Let's talk with researcher Do Won-im, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, about tips on drug safety use for healthy lives for the elderly in the era of long-term disease. Hello, researcher.

◇ Do Won-im, a researcher at the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (hereinafter referred to as Do Won): Hello,

◆Park Gwi-bin: The prescribed usage and dosage of medicines are generally based on adults, and drugs used by children have separate usage and dosage for children. So, shouldn't the elderly, that is, the elderly, use it as a general adult standard usage and dose? Do you need extra attention?

◇Dawon: In general, as aging progresses, the amount of water and muscle in the body decreases, the amount of fat in the body increases, and the digestive function decreases as the gastrointestinal movement decreases. Therefore, the elderly may have a lower physiological function overall, resulting in different drug absorption, excretion, and drug effects than ordinary adults.As a result, even if the same drug is used in the same amount, caution is needed because it is sensitive to the toxic effect of the drug and is likely to cause harmful drug reactions in the elderly.

◆Park Gui-bin: As far as I know, drugs are based on the results of clinical trials on humans, are elderly people not considered in clinical trials when developing drugs?

◇Dohwon: There are many limitations when selecting subjects because ethical issues must be considered in addition to time and economic issues when developing new drugs. If no singularity is found in healthy adults or in a limited range of patients, clinical trials are not conducted separately in various subjects. For this reason, clinical trials are often not conducted only for the elderly. However, it is possible to predict the results of elderly people who weigh less or have decreased kidney and liver function than ordinary adults because various clinical trials take into account various factors such as weight, kidney function, and liver function of subjects are conducted in the new drug development stage.

◆Park Gui-bin: Korea has a high level of medical care and a good medical insurance system, so if you use the drug with the prescription of a doctor and the guidance of a pharmacist, you will be able to monitor the appropriate dose and manage side effects.

◇Dawon: That's right. Korea's medical level is high, so it can be fully managed. However, there are quite a few elderly people who go to various hospitals with the same disease. If you go to several hospitals, doctors and pharmacists cannot properly grasp the drugs they usually take, so each hospital and pharmacy often prescribes similar drugs in duplicate. So, going to one hospital can prevent unnecessary cases of taking a lot of drugs. If you choose a pharmacy you want to go to, you can see the prescriptions you've received from various hospitals at a glance, preventing you from taking the same drug at the same time.

◆Park Gui-bin: I've heard the news that medical shopping is serious, going to various hospitals with the same disease. In particular, the side effects in the elderly with poor physiological functions are likely to be more serious.

◇ Do-won: Yes, overdosing on drugs can cause major problems. Even if different drugs are used to treat the same disease, taking the same ingredients with the same pharmacological mechanism or the same path to excretion at the same time can cause major side effects. Therefore, medical shopping-level hospital treatment is not recommended for safe drug use and health care. On the other hand, people who are not familiar with taking drugs may arbitrarily stop prescribed drugs because they are concerned about drug side effects. In fact, there were cases in which elderly people who thought they were okay because their blood pressure was not controlled while taking high blood pressure drugs and were hospitalized due to complications, and in some cases, they were hospitalized for high blood sugar comas after arbitrarily stopping taking diabetes drugs. Don't discontinue the prescribed chronic disease treatment arbitrarily, and make sure to take it as prescribed.

◆Park Guivin: How about over-the-counter drugs that can be purchased directly, not prescribed drugs? It's a change of seasons with a large daily temperature difference, and people buy over-the-counter medicines at pharmacies and use them a lot. Are there any precautions for older adults when using common cold medicine?

◇ Dowon: Drugs that have a lot of side effects in the elderly are anticholinergic. Typical examples of anticholinergic ingredients are antihistamines used for itching and runny nose. These ingredients are contained a lot in general cold medicine and allergy medicine. Drowsiness, dry mouth, and urine retention, which are common adverse drug reactions of these drugs, are likely to appear in the elderly. If purchased at a pharmacy without a doctor's prescription, take it after sufficient consultation with the pharmacist, and do not take it in excess or for a long time. Drowsiness may occur after taking it, so do not drive or operate dangerous machines, and do not take alcohol, sleeping pills, or stabilizers at the same time.

◆Park Gui-bin: If you take prescription drugs for a chronic disease and use prescription drugs for a cold, you may forget to take them. What should I do if I forget to take my medication?

◇ Do-won: Of course, it's best not to forget to take your medication and take it regularly, but if you forget to take it and remember it over time, you should take it immediately when you think of it. However, when the next administration time is too close, you have to wait and take it at the next administration time. However, you should never take twice the dose considering the amount you forgot to take at this time.

◆Park Gui-bin: It's a problem to forget to take medication when using it normally, but it's also important to keep it at home, right? Please also tell me about the precautions when storing medicines at home.

◇Dawon: When you store drugs at home, you may forget the purpose of the drug after a long period of time. So, I would like to recommend that you write down the name, use, and expiration date of the drug and keep it. Drugs that have expired can act as poison rather than treatment, so you should throw them away. In general, drugs prepared at pharmacies are not in packaging managed and manufactured at drug manufacturers, but are different from packaging shipped from drug manufacturers, so they are different from the expiration date authorized by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety. Once opened and repackaged, the drug is shorter than the indicated expiration date, so even if the drug is within the expiration date, do not take it and throw it away if its color or smell has changed. In addition, an elderly man with poor vision mistook instantaneous glue for eye drops and caused an accident. Please store items similar to medicines and packaging, such as instantaneous adhesives, separately from medicines. No matter how good the drug is, it can be toxic if used incorrectly. I reiterate that the elderly need a lot of attention from their surroundings for safe drug use.

◆Park Gui-bin: He said that drugs can be rather poisonous if used incorrectly than treated. Then how about applying it? Should I throw away ointment products after the expiration date?

◇Dawon: It's good to throw it away. If you look at it at first, fine water can enter because you open it once and use it. Before using it, be sure to check the properties before using it.

◆Park Gui-bin: I was Do Won-im, a researcher at the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety.