▲ What are the cautions when we take medicines?

We visit the hospital and are diagnosed when we are sick, but it doesn’t end there. Diseases aren't cured by a simple diagnosis. Sometimes you need to take prescription medication. There are some things to think about when you are taking medicine. Each medicine has different directions for use, and it is important we become aware of them before we take anything. The Dankook Herald (DKH) will provide the information you need.

Can you use your medicine safely? Medicine can improve our health, or worsen it, depending on the circumstances in which we take it. Misuse or overuse will make your health worse. Misuse is when people take medicine incorrectly. If you take medicine but don’t know how to use and/or use carelessly, this is misuse. Overuse happens when people take more than the recommended dosage. This can occur when you take medicine prescribed by the hospital and take a general over the counter pharmaceutical too. For instance, when your prescribed medicine contains ‘ibuprofen’ and then you take an over-the-counter medicine that contains ‘acetaminophen’. (Over-thecounter medicine mean that they can be sold at the small shop without a prescription because when taken as directed, it is quite safe.)

Can you get information about prescription medicine? DKH learned how to take medication properly. First, you should read the prescription carefully to ensure it is in fact yours. There are many people who hand in prescriptions to a pharmacist without checking the information on the page. It is very important that you check your personal information. There was a case where a person was given a prescription for someone else with the same name at the same hospital. This was potentially very dangerous. For instance, if one of these people were prescribed medicine to increase their blood pressure and the other person had normal blood pressure, taking the medicine could result in complications. If the person taking the incorrect medicine had hypertension or high blood pressure, the problem could be fatal. So, you must make a habit of checking the personal information data on the prescription before handing it to the pharmacist. Second, you need to read the name of the prescription medicine. This will contain the ingredient information of the medicine. If you read the name of the prescribed medicine, you are able to look up the ingredients on the internet whenever you have questions.

Why we should drink water when we take medicine? Doctors recommend that you take medicine with as much water as possible. If you take medicine with coffee, milk or any other drink, there can be side effects. Complex-shaped component painkillers, a kind of painkiller, contains caffeine that helps the painkilling effect. If you take this painkiller after drinking coffee, you can overdose on caffeine and suffer from insomnia. Dairy products like milk, and yogurt can also be the wrong way to take prescription medicine. They interrupt the absorption of the medicine because they are mainly composed of heavy particles. Calcium, that is found in dairy products, reduces the absorption of medicines for things like Osteoporosis and hormone preparations for thyroid problems. Calcium can also result in the medicine becoming more complex and insoluble in water so that it can't be absorbed well when you take it with a
dairy product. It too is a reason that you must drink water when you take medicine.

These are some methods for taking medicine that seems simple but are often ignored because people don't know the reasons why we do them. From now on you should get to know the ingredients of your medication right way before taking it. The ingredients mentioned in this report are the most common ingredients for fever reduction, cold medicine and so on, so if you keep these methods in mind, you will be able to understand what you are prescribed easily. There's no harm in knowing the importance of these ingredients and in fact knowing can be better for your health. We are interested in our health and sensitive to matters that relate to our health. Your twenties is an important period of time for creating healthy habits that will last your lifetime.