You’ve just returned from the drugstore with a bag full of prescriptions. There are big green pills, small yellow ones, and a chalky pink suspension. You look at your doctor’s note and see that each must be taken at a certain time of day.
Bah! Humbug!
It’s just medicine. Before breakfast, after breakfast — what difference does it make as long as it gets in your body and does its job, right?
Not quite.
What is medication adherence?
Medication adherence simply means following your healthcare provider’s instructions on when and how to take your medication. Even so, many Americans fail to properly follow their doctor’s directives, which results in health complications, unnecessary hospitalization, and even death.
Why does your doctor tell you when to take your meds?
During a health check or your Annual Medicare Wellness Visit, your healthcare provider will go over the medicines you take and may also prescribe new ones. They will instruct you when and how to take them, depending on the drugs’:
- Time sensitivity
- Steady state concentration
- Interactions
1. Time Sensitivity of Medicine
‘Time sensitive’ drugs are those that absolutely must be taken at a specific time, either because of the way they are absorbed or because of their side effects.
Some medications are absorbed in your body faster if there is no digestive interference. Your stomach and small intestine need to focus on breaking the drug down and releasing its active ingredients quickly into your bloodstream. In such a case, your doctor will tell you to take the drug on an ‘empty stomach’. This usually comes to either one hour before, or two hours after, a meal.
On the other hand, you might be prescribed a drug that irritates your stomach and causes nausea or vomiting. Your healthcare provider will have you take this kind of medicine with food to cut down the unpleasant side effects.
Time sensitivity also determines whether you should take a drug at bedtime, or first thing in the morning. Some medicines cause drowsiness, others cause insomnia. Knowing when to take yours will help you manage your health better.
2. Steady State Concentration of Drugs
For most chronic diseases, it is necessary to have a certain quantity of a drug’s active ingredient in your body at all times. The level should be even, consistent, and the amount going into your body should be equal to the amount being excreted. To maintain this steady state concentration, you will need to take the drug at regular intervals. This ensures the active ingredient stays stable and does not spike or dip.
Even for acute illnesses such as a urinary tract infection, your doctor will instruct you to follow a schedule. If, for any reason, you do not take your prescribed dosage at the scheduled time, the active ingredient in the antibiotic will fall below optimum levels and the medicine will be ineffective against rapidly multiplying bacteria.
Conversely, if you take your dosages too close together, there will be a surge of active ingredient in your body, and you will most likely end up with diarrhea.
3. Interaction
There are three kinds of drug interactions: with a health condition, with food, and with other drugs. The effects of these can range from mildly unpleasant to deadly.
Medication adherence is crucial to avoid dangerous reactions between different drugs. As a senior adult, it is likely that you’re juggling more than one health condition, and are probably taking different medications for each. This increases the risk of drug-drug interaction.
Medication you take for one disease may exacerbate your other health condition. Or the active ingredient in one drug may reduce or cancel the effectiveness of your other drugs. Because of this, your healthcare provider will schedule your medications so that there is an adequate time gap between them.
To check for any negative drug-drug interactions between your medications, you can use this handy tool.
Practice Responsibility
You are the ultimate keeper of your own health, so make medication adherence a rule. Talk to your healthcare provider and follow their instructions on when and how to take your medication. You will be able to manage your healthcare much better and save yourself a wealth of trouble.