Thursday, October 28, 2010

Missed Meds - The Ongoing Dilemma

As I arrived at work today, I thought to myself "Oh crap - did I take my meds this morning?" This is not particularly new, but it also doesn't happen too often. I am generally in a very good routine about my meds. They are kept in the same location, I have a weekly pill box which I fill up every Sunday, and I order three months worth of pills through Medco. It's a good setup.

But on those mornings when I find myself questioning whether I took those meds, I find myself going over all of the different options...
- can I take an hour+ out of my workday to go all the way back home and check? It's one thing if I'm walking towards the subway, but already at work?
- If I keep a "spare dose" on me for emergency situations, can I ever be 100% sure that I did, in fact, miss a dose? Double dosing is not something I want to do...
- do I simply miss a dose and hope for the best?

I find myself almost invariably coming back to this third option, but I also think of all the people out there who, for whatever their illness, have even more challenging pill regimens than my own. I take meds in the morning, and meds at night, and I am not bound by specific times, just looking to generally try and take them regularly and about 12 hours apart.

I can't imagine having pill regimens that required me to take pills three, four, five times a day... different pills at different intervals... even having to wake up in the middle of the night to take a dose.

I suppose all I can do is continue to make every effort to be as diligent as possible in my schedule, and hope that if and when I do miss a dose, by brain doesn't make me pay.