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The conditions in many medicine cabinets turn out to be detrimental for medicines-some worse than others.
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There are no gloves in my glove compartment.
I take it you live in a rather temperate climate, i only ever put gloves in mine once i moved up north.
Its nice not having to walk back in the house to get gloves to clear snow off my truck
Exactly this. I have one of those cabinets in my bathroom; the door mirror allows me to angle the mirror and I store toothpaste, mouth wash, full bottles of shampoo (because they are cheaper on sale if you buy 3 or 4), cotton pads and stuff like that, but no gloves.. I mean medicine
@@100GTAGUY I do the same, but for the opposite reason. Sometimes my steering wheel is too hot to touch and I have to wear gloves to drive home.
@@100GTAGUY If it's that cold I would be wearing a coat leaving the house. My gloves are in the pockets of my winter coat. The glove box is really inconvenient to get to from the driver seat and I want my gloves with me when I go out in my backyard to clean off snow too.
I mean you do you, but living in a cold climate, I don't know anyone who keeps gloves in their glove compartment. It's usually insurance and registration papers. My parents still have CDs in there. No gloves though.
@@Hugh.Manatee Wow, you have a really big Medicine Cabinet.
In old houses, the medicine cabinets sometimes have a slit in the back for you to drop the blade from your safety razor after you shave. The cabinets I've seen don't have any way to clear out the old blades short of ripping the cabinet out of the wall. It's kinda crazy that some houses have a big pile of razor blades just sitting there behind the wall.
With the kind of steel they were made of, you'd have a pile of mostly just rust after not too long. The really scary image though is when you realize that in a lot of those really old houses the blades would end up in the crawl space instead, ready to surprise anyone working under the house.
@@Jwellsuhhuh it was designed for razor blade disposal. Showing m age here, but it was common growing up.
@@robertheinkel6225 what do you do once it fills up?
@@Jwellsuhhuhsell your house
@@smears6039 💀
"Take insulin, for example."*
*Not medical advice.
Take my mother-in-law for example.
...
I mean it. Take her!
Well, the most common problem is that insulin (a protein) "denatures". Like when heating egg-white (which originally is transparent almost like water), the stuff begins looking "milky". If you look at a cartridge and it looks milky, you know it's gone bad. But it takes an astonishing amount of effort (or stupidity) to get to that point-
Does she speaks too much or is she aggressive? 😂@@lakrids-pibe
@@KaiHenningsen Thank you! As a diabetic, I love this!
@@lakrids-pibeGod took mine and I had never been happier
"That little cabinet guests like to snoop through so you put marbles in it to catch them..."
In none of the households I've lived in did people keep pills in the bathroom. In every household I've lived in, they're kept in the kitchen or the user's purse. I keep my 101 yr old grandfather's 6 meds on the top shelf in his closet and fill his pill tray every Sunday.
I keep my meds on my dresser, which is also where I fill my weekly pill organizer. It keeps them cool and dry without having in an inconvenient place.
Thank you for helping your grandfather. We'll all need that kind of help, if we live long enough.
The purse isn't much better if you go outside though!
I assumed it was just a weird game mechanic for healing in the game Mafia.
I know some older houses/people who do keep medication there.
But basically the only thing I've seen there for people my generation is birth control pills (the daily ones, not emergency).
Mayyybe with some painkillers, but rarely...
Prilosec and Nexium are proton pump inhibitors, Ranitidine is an H2 histamine receptor antagonist. Just because they are all "heartburn medications" does not mean they are interchangeable substitutes for each other if you are using it for other things like histamine release or metabolism disorders, allergies, bee sting kits that include H1 and H2 antihistamines etc. I thought it was very interesting when I learned that some bee keepers have "heartburn" meds in their first aid kit and also that one of the effects of histamine is to tell your body to make a bunch of stomach acid, presumably to kill whatever bad thing you possibly just ate.
It might make an interesting video to cover some of the medications that have been replaced with newer drugs with entirely different mechanisms and the ways the previous ones are still used. Cromolyn is another example that I think was the first asthma medication and is still used for other things but usually not asthma.
I did not know that and it makes so much sense for the H2 inhibitor is part of a bee keeper's med kit. I agree that an episode about this would be interesting. Thanks. 👍👍
Yeah, the chemistry of medicine and how the same chemical’s uses can change is wild. Like Botox, derived from a bacterial toxin, originally a migraine treatment, and now primarily used as a cosmetic treatment.
As a person who has heartburn but only occasionally, I was somewhat unimpressed with the alternatives available the first time I went to buy ranitidine and it wasn't there. They all seemed to be take every day type pills that would take up to a week to work (but with warnings to talk to your doctor if you get heartburn for more than a fortnight?), not take as needed pills like ranitidine was. I use Gaviscon now, but that can be annoying if my heartburn is after dinner, because I tend to eat fairly close to bedtime and the layer of alginate doesn't work too well if you're lying down. Plus the measuring cups are hard to get clean, and the chewable tablets get all stuck in my teeth.
@@erink476You might want to try baking soda. Add 1/2 to 1 teaspoon ( I believe that would be 2.5 to 5 ml) to a small glass of water, stir and drink. It will taste a bit salty so follow it with another drink of water. The only issue I've found is that it will make you burp.
As a fibromyalgia patient I was given a medication that was originally used for depression treatment- it ends up helping with muscle relaxation and improves sleep. Also gives you a bit of a fuzzy happy 😅
“Don’t go based on vibes”, well there go my life plans…
Go based on vibes for things like "which shirt is more me" and "is this date going well"
Go based on numbers for things like "is this pill expired" and "will that kill me"
😁
Medical Vibe Check
Same
That probably works out well for you, being a woman and all
My SOP is everything but tetracycline is safe but a bit weaker after the expiration date, that’s how safe they’re keeping us. But the “changes color or smells funny” is a good common sense clarification. Kinna like using milk, for best results use before becoming putrid or changes state of matter.
In Europe and in other parts of the worlds, tablettes and pills always come in blister packages, so humidity is not that much of a concern, as they are watertight. And in Central and Northern Europe flats and houses usually don't come with an A/C, so every room, that has a window may heat up siginificantly in the summer. The bathroom is often on the inside without a window and is the room with the least temperature fluctuation. In older houses, where the water water is heated on the spot with a boiler or flow heater, the cabinet is usually on the wall, where the cold water pipes run through, so it's passively cooled.
Yeah, temperature fluctuation can do just as much damage if not more. Stable is good.
I wonder if that has to do with how medicine cabinets got started?
Not really, it depends on what you keep in your cabinet. While I agree most medicine is in the blisters in Europe, while buying supplements (they are also either tablettes or pills, after all) I can easily get them in a bottle or self standing doypack pouch and I prefer the bottle for the supplements.
Just change the name. Mine's full of hair products, bandaids, comb, brush, toothpaste, mouthwash .... the pills go in the kitchen... where all the stuff that goes in your mouth is. 🤷♀️
I like the little cabinet on the wall with a mirror.
vanity cabinet?
mouthwash is bad :(
@@croozerdog It is? Do you have an explanation and/or further reading on the matter?
@@birb7353 maybe they mean the taste...
@@birb7353 im trying to link you, I learned it from dutch public broadcast but youtube is either not showing me my own comment or getting secretly removed in their bronk anti bot system -.-
i just clicked one of the first links that didn't seem like it wanted to sell you stuff, askthedentist. The best you can do and the thing they also did in the program is literally asking your dentist. even the assistant answering the phone was surprised to learn her boss discouraged it. the marketing claims it cleans your mouth, because it does, but that isn't a good thing unless you have unwanted bacterial infections. the people who made it didn't use it themselves and said they're making a product to feel clean rather than make you clean.
At first I thought he said zantac broke down into MDMA so I was about to go steam my bottle. 😂😅
😂😂😂
😂😮😅then 😢
I did a double-take too lol
Keeping medicine in the bathroom never made sense to me, but never thought about the humidity/temp. My priorities were/are about privacy, safety, and security.
Security is definitely a concern. A visitor to my house took a prescription medicine from my medicine cabinet. That was the last time he was allowed in the house and the last time I kept a med like that in the medicine cabinet.
Huh
@@donaldwert7137I’ve also had this problem. I’m on some pretty strong pain medication and I found that someone I invited over had helped herself to a strip of my oxy. I was furious and let’s say, she’s no longer my friend.
@@laratheplanespotter If I found out someone I knew stole some of my painkillers I would keep the upset part to myself and instead ask they “hey dude are you okay????? There something you need to talk about?”
@@LordDomielOfElysium That person is likely literally only your friend because they know you have drugs xD
In Sweden you get a special bag from the pharmacy that you put all your used medicines in and return to the pharmacy. They have a responsibility to accept old meds (with some exceptions).
UK we don't get a bag but pharmacies have a duty to take any meds, expired or not if for example someone's meds have changed. I actually have a couple of meds I need to take to the pharmacy but need to wait for a rare good mobility day, I get my meds delivered but the pharmacy assistant who delivers my meds aren't allowed to take them from me when delivering my current meds to take back to the pharmacy. I get why, but it's difficult when you have limited mobility and live alone.
OH MY GOD. IF ONLY.
I do wonder what they do with those meds though? It would be nice if they actually had a safer way of disposing them that doesn't involve them ending up in the water/sewer system or in a landfill somewhere, but I'm not so sure they do.
@nixi-bixi I live in the UK too and everytime I've tried taking my unused medicines back they look at me confused with no idea about the scheme and most of them make a specific point to throw it in their normal bin in front of me with full eye contact ...safe to say I don't bother anymore😂
@@oksanakaido8437 They burn it in special facilities because it gets REALLY harmful when it mixes with other meds
With the point on how to reduce the humidity in the bathroom, you should be running the fan for more reasons than just preserving the medicines a bit longer. You also don't particularly want to encourage mold growth in your bathroom.
I don't keep my meds in the bathroom, but I run the fan when I shower anyway. A bonus effect is it makes my mirror fog up less.
Not all bathrooms have fans though
@@langly27 If your bathroom has no ventilation, you may want to remedy that. If it's ventilation is just an open-able window, that's better than nothing, but not quite as useful as a fan.
Wtf @@langly27
but what if I'm growing penicillin in my medicine cabinet?
Australia has 90% of it's medications packaged in sheets which protects it from moisture, for pain medication it has a tendency to swell and break the foil of the sheet making it noticable, if your medication has done that on it's own, best to just throw the entire sheet out and check the expiration date
in that order?
1:03 I’m one of those people! And yes it is an incredibly dull job, mostly because manufacturers are pretty good at making stable products and packaging so the vast majority of the reports we send back are just long winded ways of saying “Yep, still good”. But sometimes we get to do fun things like seeing what happens when you perform the testing at 35°C with 90% humidity, yay!
I think that's a cool job to have! 😅
Analytical chemist & microbiologist are everyday heros keeping all our food, drugs, water .... safe.
Hi, I'm also working on stability studies :) Not a dull job for me, we get (unfortunately) a lot of excitement with some products. Though I work directly at the manufacturing site, so I then sometimes get to go through the issues with the product team and develop a safer, more stable product.
@@jandavac Yeah I’m in a third party company so the vast majority of issues have already been ironed out by the time the samples get to my team, which is both a blessing and a curse.
I want to do the job. Boring jobs means I can think about D&D more effectively at work! 😂
If the comments section is any indicator, the alternative place people keep their meds is the kitchen - also a room that experiences temperature/humidity swings due to cooking and not exactly an optimal alternative!
People in general are notoriously bad in how they manage their meds - leaving them in a purse or console of a hot car, taking the desiccant pack out of the bottle because they get annoyed about how it always shakes out of the bottle before the pills...
I live in a studio apartment, so I don't have much of a choice, but at least I keep my meds the furthest away from the stove that I can! Even when I'm cooking though, the temperature very rarely climbs above 24C-25C and running the overhead fan usually keeps the humidity down. The alternative is keeping my meds in one of the cupboards above my bed, but that is far more inconvenient.
I keep em by my bed so I don't have to get up to take them lol
My meds occupy the top of the dresser in my bedroom.
Better temperature and humidity range, no direct sunlight, and helps remind me to take them when I wake up.
Tbh, I still think it's incomparable. The bathroom can get so humid there's drops of water on the walls. I've never seen a kitchen get that humid. Also, kitchens are usually a bit bigger, sometimes connecting directly to the living room, with no door at all, etc. So I don't think it can get as bad as a bathroom.
@@kathorsees Kitchens also usually have windows while bathrooms don't, unless you live in a house (all the apartments I lived in had a "blind" bathroom). There are cooker hoods to help with the hot fumes. I'd say in general, there is better ventilation in a kitchen versus a bathroom.
I've never thought too much about it, but we do not call it a medicine cabinet here in Brazil. We usually call it either just "cabinet" or "the little door in the bathroom" or "the mirror door" or something like that
we do not store medicine in it, BTW. It's just where we put all the bathroom stuff like toothbrush, deodorant, razor, etc.
true
Isso, isso!
@@DarthGTB Even though I'm over 70 I don't take any medicine , I just keep some OTC stuff in the first aid kit. So I use the cabinet like you do, for soap and shampoo and toothpaste & brush.
In Louisiana, we call it "FaceTime with Candyman." 😂
00:32 that stock photographer needs to change his toothbrushes more often
No, we absolutely do not store medicine in the medicine cabinet. Not because the bathroom is a bad place for medicine, though. One, we need that storage space for other, bathroom-related things, like leave-in conditioner, moisturizer, hair brush, etc. And two, we have WAAAAY too much medication to fit in that cabinet. It takes up a whole drawer (18x20x10 inches) and is so full it's hard to get the drawer open.
I'm sorry that seems like a huge pain in the ass
What on earth, why do you need a whole pharmacy at home? I keep exactly zero medication. The last pill of paracetamol I've owned was probably 6 years ago. Just take a hot shower for headache!
I don't understand pill poppers, they seem to be their own pharmacist 😂😂
@@tomaccino some people have bigger problems than a wittle headache sometimes, tommy. And why would I take a shower for the second time today when I could just take some Excedrin? Hot water isn't good for your skin, honey, dries you out. Why don't you go do your homework or something while the adults talk, yeah?
@@tomaccino Just take a shower for a headache? One, that assumes my headaches can be abated by showers (they can't) and two, that's a hell of a lot of water to waste for those of us who get headaches almost daily.
So what I'm hearing from you is, you have no first aid supplies, and no serious health issues. Good for you! (?)
@@tomaccino are you really totally unaware that a lot of people have multiple health problems and that they often require a whole bunch of doctor prescribed or recommended meds and supplements?
I’m a type 1 diabetic who used to be a beach lifeguard, I’d keep my insulin pens in my bag on the stand with me, no ice packs or anything, and despite the hot summer heats they’d generally hold up well for weeks. I’d notice some slight drops in the impact, like maybe I’d need to take 1 extra unit, but it was amazing to me bc I’d always been told growing up to keep them cool and do not let them get hot.
We have a first aid cupboard in the kitchen? But it’s mostly sealed bandages and dressings.
Considering the high rate of potential accidents on offer in a kitchen, it just made sense to me to keep supplies there. For example if a burn is sustained that needs further treatment, after keeping it under running water for 20 minutes, the burn safe dressings are within arms reach of the kitchen sink.
Yeah my family has had everything from first aid to pill bottles in a kitchen cabinet in one of the corners of it and I never thought much of it
I'm glad kitchens don't contain running water, garbage, spills, food, pets, visitors, insects, rodents, young children, or any other thing that might damage (the same things a person might put in a medicine cabinet).
@@VideoNozokiYou might want to re-read the original comment again. The first aid kit in the kitchen is inside a cupboard; that's two protective layers.
Growing up, we had a kitchen cabinet half given over to first aid supplies, and a poison treatment chart with the phone number of the poison treatment center taped to the inside of the cabinet door.
@@VideoNozokiTo be fair, if a kitchen is that bad, I don't think anyone should be eating, cooking or just being there.
I can also hardly imagine chopping up veggies or boiling a pot of stew inside my kitchen cabinet next to the pills. But hey, maybe I just need to get bigger kitchen cabinets 🤔
My current house doesn't even have a medicine cabinet but when i had one, i didn't stored medicine in it (the exception being topical drugs like tiger balm). I used it for storing toiletries like toothpaste.
Having worked in social care (delivering and coordinating it) medicine cabinets are great as it is often an obvious place for the patient, visiting care staff and medical prescribers. It lessens the risk of stock outs or incorrect administration as keeping them in one (or 2) location(s) makes it easier to keep track of them. Sometimes special storage like refrigeration is required so that makes two storage areas. The absolute worst case is medications stored across a property (especially if there are frequent changes to prescriptions or frequent hospital admissions (where the patient returns home with a new set of medications which superspeed previous ones)). Once there are agreed places of storage that can be noted in care plans, doctor records and pharmacy records as required to minimise medication administration issues.
I use to religiously keep all my medications in one place. But I fell behind checking the expiration date and with numerous med changes and dosage changes it got really out of hand. I’ve managed to put one of each daily (ORAL) med in one container and one of each (ORAL) PRN med in another that I keep next to my bed… but I’m constantly loosing track of refills when I can’t combine them with the few pills left in one bottle, or when the packaging is not the normal sized pill bottle (odt packaging, 1 pill per packet because there’s only brand name and they can make it as fancy to add to the surcharge. Liquid medicine that never fits anywhere. Oh and topical medication 🙃. At least I always know my biologics are in the fridge. ) I’ll run out of some meds because I think I have more in another place but more often I refill meds and then realize I had 3 other full bottles.
I’m the most knowledgeable polypharmacy pt and yet just the other week I forgot to add THE BIG WHITE PILL IVE TAKEN FOR YEARS to my pill box.
1. Do *not* "toss out" medicine. They need to be disposed of properly, at least where I live (Finland) that is by taking them back to the pharmacy in their original packaging.
2. I've not ever seen a medicine cabinet in a bathroom in my life, that just doesn't seem to be thing in Finland. OTOH, we quite often don't have AC, so the indoor temperatures can get to 30C in the summer in any room.
Wrapping medicine in a towel and putting it in the back of a cupboard is how we help keep them cool in my household in Australia (we also don't have an air conditioner)
In my hometown in the US the police and fire departments each do a medicine collection every six months so every three months there is a push to clean out old medicines. You're still welcome to bring them in anytime though. Never really considered bringing them back to a pharmacy although I'm not on any prescriptions so I don't consider pharmacies much at all.
Only 30C? Must be nice to live somewhere cool. Where I live there's no way you're getting less than 40C indoors during summer, if you don't have AC. So everyone does, lol.
@@chere100 yeah, but the thing is, still most people don't have AC here. More and more do, since the summer weather has become more erratic, and as practically all AC units sold here work also as heat pumps, they serve as a back up heating method provided you have something else than direct electric heating, and in the case of direct electric heating, will save you a lot of money. But you can't always have those installed - if you live in a rental, or can't get the permission from the home owner's association equivalent etc. Or just plain can't afford.
@KaspYAR, the towel trick probably would work, but we have relatively humid air, often outdoor relative humidity reaches 100%, so you would have to be careful to not get mold. You would prbably need to have a plastic container on a table for that. Good trick to have though, in case of some medicine being really tricky with the temperature. And reminds me, the pharmacies sell travel containers for medicines that work on the evaporation heat dissipation, which might be handy, though I think they might cool the medicines even a bit too much, closer to fridge temperatures.
@@chere100 You had exactly the same thought I did reading this comment, lol.
Ranitadine was my go to med. ☹️
It was only $6/ bottle and it WORKED. the study when this all happened only said that it COULD increase the cancer risk if temps reached advice 200°F. I was so mad that it got pulled if out takes that kind of extreme.
You are exactly correct. The original paper said they stored it at 55C (130F) for a month to generate NDMA. Later tests showed that somewhat lower temps and longer times would also work. But in anything like normal temperatures or normal times it really wasn't a problem.
100% agree. PPIs also work fine for me so I wasn't *too* mad, but man ranitidine was so much better than other H2 blockers. And there are good concrete reasons to prefer H2 blockers over PPIs, most especially that H2 blockers work quickly and PPIs don't.
There are also some studies that imply that taking a PPI for very long periods of time can have some concerning long term side effects, which while it concerns me less overall also is very ironic in this situation.
Pepcid (famotidine) works so much better though. -lady who accidentally took 5 year old expired ranitidine stored in the bathroom while pregnant
The best part is that heartburn causes cancer too! So you're saving yourself from trace quantities of a probable carcinogen so your body can instead cook itself into cancer instead!
@@CharlotteRainePepcid works so much better FOR YOU. Medicines don't work on everybody the same way.
The only medicine we keep in the medicine cabinet is stuff like polysporin, nasal spray or skin creams. Pills are stored in the kitchen because that's where we keep the glasses. We store insulin in the fridge.
wait. you are telling me you dont:
1. fill a glass with water.
2. put said glass down on the counter.
3. go to the bathroom.
4. forget life.
5. 20 minutes later go back to the bathroom then kitchen and finally take the medicine.
@@emperorjj1 Yeah, and then wonder why my headache won't go away.
These were what they were originally meant for. Back then in the early 20th century, these topical non-ingestibles would be stored in these bathroom medicine cabinets.
That cabinet in the bathroom is for tooth brushes, hairbrushes etc. Meds, firstaid, etc are in a cabinet in the kitchen. :)
Smart thinking! You're also more likely to dangerously injure yourself in/by the kitchen than the bathroom unless it's a slip and fall in which case bandaids aren't gonna help you there.
i keep my meds on top of the fridge ive never thought of a cabinet in a bathroom as a medicine cabinet
some bot stole your comment and got more likes...
@@LucidLuci666on top of the fridge? The fridge is a heat pump that pulls heat from inside to the surrounding. Depending on the design, the top of the fridge will be warmer than the room.
Another bonus to putting your toothbrush in the medicine cabinet, it reduces (but doesn't fully eliminate) the toothbrush's exposure to fecal bacteria wafted about when you poo and flush.
And people laughed when Monk poured boiling water over his toothbrush before using it.
Oh you got my FULL attention when you said "Ranitidine." My husband used to take that quite a lot, and I didn't realize it had vanished... (not least because the doctors changed him first to lansoprazole (aka Prevacid), and then changed AGAIN to pantoprazole/Protonix)
I did know about the heat/humidity thing, which is why most of our medications have a nice little spot in a drawer or bedroom cabinet or that kind of thing. We don't actually have medicine cabinets, but I suspect that's because this old place has "cover the whole wall" mirrors in the bathroom -.-
I very much appreciate the way you clarified all this too! It's important to know what to look for and just as important to know what your actual RISK is! Listen to your pharmacist folks, and read your labels.
Mine is just extra storage in a tiny bathroom, holding my skincare, toothpaste, deodorant and some of my makeup. I keep my medicines either in my kitchen cabinet (furthest from the stove) or by my bed.
I got a drawer in a sideboard dedicated for everything medical related. The bathroom cabinet only contains bathroom stuff. And when I shower...I shower hot, like steaming hot. I know that's not good for anything that can decay.
I love the old ones with a razor blade disposal slot that just drops between the walls.
I made a metal blade slot to put on the wall just because I don't have one.
and it stays there forever till the house is demolished?
@@chrism3784yes those where built in the sixties they weren’t exactly known for future proving things back then
@@queenofcookie3299 probably going to be the same for the future generations who's going to have to clean the world of plastic waste. Sure they will have stuff to say about us.
@@chrism3784 I mean kinda but not really? Nobody today has a purpose built hole in their wall just to shove plastic into for the next person to deal with.
"store in a cool dry place."
Me too, bro. I need a cool dry place too.
Hi Hank!
My next band name will be Aspirin AKA Asprin.
"Next" band? How many bands have you gone through already? :-P
@@AndyGneiss A few:
Me and the Male Boys
Avalanche of Assetry
Flirting With Cornbread
Kelvin and the Absolute Zeroes
and my personal favorite so far,
The Gum Cuzzlers
Aspirin is a Bayer trade name, the substance is named acetylsalicylic acid
"Aspirin" was originally a Bayer trade name, but it has become widely genericized, so in many places it is available under that name regardless of manufacturer.
@@TJStellmachI haven't called ASA "asprin" for decades. Is that an American thing?
Maybe, but it’s also a thing in New Zealand 🤷
@@TJStellmach Bayer lost its trademark for Aspirin in the United States and some other countries in actions taken between 1918 and 1921 because it had failed to use the name for its own product correctly and had for years allowed the use of "Aspirin" by other manufacturers without defending the intellectual property rights.
Bayer hasn't had the trademark on Aspirin in ages. The Bayer trademark is "Bayer Back & Body."
I never keep medicine in the bathroom. I keep everything but medicine in the medicine cabinet. Lol. We use it for our toothbrushes, toothpaste, and mouthwash.
I brush my teeth in the kitchen, I got tired of unclogging the bathroom sink with tooth paste junk. The kitchen is also cleaner and doesn't get poop particles on my toothbrush when I flush.
@@thecodemachineIf you keep your toothbrush in the medicine cabinet then you don't get any flume on it. And the idea of spitting in a kitchen sink where I keep my dishes grosses me out.
@LKMNOP why?
@@LKMNOP I can accept that spitting in the kitchen sink grosses you out.
It doesn't do the same for many people, but there is no reason to be attacked over it, or feel shame about it.
What grosses me out is the bathroom cup that multiple people in the house use to rinse after brushing, leaving it to catch all kinds of fecal bacteria and other growth between uses.
@@LKMNOP "where I keep my dishes" But surely you only keep the DIRTY dishes there, which aren't any grosser than your spit?
That cabinet in the bathroom is for tooth brushes, hairbrushes etc. Meds, firstaid, etc are in a cabinet in the kitchen. :).
"Zantac, please don't sue us. Again."
Interesting how all the tablets in the US seem to come in bottles. In Australia most tablets come in plastic and foil packets where each pill is individually sealed.
This is why as an autistic person I literally took to putting it in jars and a case intended for weed. It controls humidity and is fully light-blocking.
Add a bag of silica just to be on the safe side.
@@samiraperi467 Yeah they are designed to regulate humidity with some like in. I can keep it ultra low humidity and it even lets me know what humidity it is. Still a good idea.
That’s a great idea
And also make sure it's food safe too! You never know! Ymmv @@samiraperi467
im so sorry if i missed a joke or something, but.. what does autism have to do with that?😭😭
I don't have a medicine cabinet anyway. I'm a transplant recipient, so I have a *TON* of meds I need to take thrice daily. I store medication bottles in an independent drawer in my kitchen walk-in, and my med organizer filled with pills for the week is on the kitchen island.
First aid kits are kept clipped to the wall in my basement stairwell and near the front door, extra medical storage is kept in a closet by the front door near the first aid kit, and a full trauma kit is kept in my truck in the garage for first response emergencies on the road or in the home so it's always with me. I've also got a small mini-fridge in my front door closet for chilled meds and animal vaccinations, etc.
Remember to change out the meds in the trauma kit frequently! (In case you don't already know) Vehicles get way hotter than the bathroom, and they also get really cold. Temp fluctuations can also break down adhesives.
On rereading, given that you have a minifridge specifically for meds, you probably already know...
For a moment there I thought ranitidine was breaking down into MDMA
Me in my ranitidine vault after reading your comment: GOD DAMN IT
THAT'S WHAT I HEARD TOO i was like, ok hank, i see you👀
I need those cabinets for things like bandages, cotton swabs, toothpaste, etc., but stuff like this gives builders an excuse to no longer give us a place to put them, or make us almost crawl on the floor to get under the sink. Please stop discouraging them and rename them instead.
7:50 isn't that standard in the US? Around here it's *strongly recommended* to bring *all* meds (either expired, or leftovers from treatments) to the pharmacy, not all meds are good for the sewer system or the environment and pharmacists have the knowledge and network to dispose of it safely (if it's safe they'll throw it in the trash, otherwise it's moved back up the chain to be disposed of safely).
Pharmacies aren't required to offer drug disposal, so some don't. But many do.
I am curious what meds ARE good for the sewer system or the environment.
@@tylerpeterson4726 Pretty sure they have that requirement here in the EU.
The US system seems to be relatively new. Or at least wasn't well-known. I'd heard about DEA-endorsed municipal drug take-back events for a couple years, before seeing my first drug return bin at a Walgreens.
@@crash.override Yeah, those DEA drug take-backs are set up to get things like cocaine, meth and crack. I laugh at the DEA when I see people bringing their expired prescription meds.
I imagine them watching the camera they swore was not watching the drop-off and complaining that this program was not getting them enough subjects for later no-knock arrests.
My family doesn't. It's in a cupboard in the kitchen. When I go to campus accommodations I keep it in a med pouch in my cupboard section of the kitchen
Some of my meds include a silica gel capsule in the bottle. I think I’ll drop it in my advil bottle when I’m done.
Most advice bottles have one already in them.
Small bed room fridge is the best for storing various medicines. It is mostly dark, cool and out of hand of children and noticeable for daily access when needed.
But then you have fridge noise in your bedroom! It's bad enough in hotels, but to have that permanently in my home bedroom... hell NO!
Wouldn't that keep many medications too cool? Hank just said that Tylenol doesn't like being under 20C, and fridges usually go to 4C!
Aren't fridges kind of humid tho?
No: counterintuitively, the air in a fridge is quite dry. This is why thrice-fried chips (French fries) are often refrigerated between fryings, because drying them out gives a crunchier result.
I don't know if they're not a thing here in Italy or I'm just out of touch, but I've only ever seen bathroom medicine cabinets in American movies and TV shows. Never had one, never heard of anyone having one
Here in Turkey, medicine usually go to fridge
Same here in Sweden, I've never heard of anyone keeping meds in the bathroom. They're usually placed where people keep their cleaning supplies or the kitchen haha
Uk, same here, we store ours in a kitchen cabinet
They’re a thing here
@@arti5musicc here where? 😅
We don't call that thing in the bathroom a "medicine cabinet" in my country. It's a "mirror cabinet" or, if you're GenX or older, an "Alibert" (brand name of the company that used to make these types of cabinets popular in the 70s). Before that, there used to be just a mirror on the wall and a little shelf underneath.
People keep combs and mouthwash and shaving cream and Q-tips and make-up remover and hair products there and pincers to pluck their eyebrows. Nobody I know keeps medicines there.
I keep my vitamins and medicines and other medical stuff, like band aids, in a drawer in the bedroom.
"combs and mouthwash and shaving cream and Q-tips and make-up remover and hair products"
Back then, that was our medicine.
Assuming you're German, yes, we do have the term "Medizinschrank" but mirror cabinets are more common.
My house had no air conditioning before 2 years ago and I live in a swamp. I'm toast lol.
I am 75 and in multiple residences I have never had air condtioning. Those include deserty areas. I have never had an air conditioned vehicle either.
@@nedludd7622 i can live without AC in the desert, just open the windows at night when it gets cool and close em early in the morning before it warms up.
Idk how my dad lived in the everglades in the 70s with no AC and them slatted windows.
Get your Cajun ass out the swamp bro. Move to a temperate clime.
@@100GTAGUYDeserts are easy, swamps SUCK. Dry heat is fine, it's the jungle/swamp heat that suuuuuucks.
Here in Brazil we also have medicine cabinets but I don't know anyone that actually stores medicine in them. It's mostly stuff like toothbrushes, soap, different creams, etc. Stuff that you use for hygiene and stuff.
"Consume Prilosec!"
I keep all my oral intake meds like pain meds, allergy meds, cold meds etc. in a cabinet in my kitchen. The only meds I keep in my bathroom are topical meds like anti-itch cream for bug bites and even then, they are kept in a drawer, not a cabinet. The bathroom cabinet by the sink is where I keep my toothpaste, deodorant, etc.
Insulin is a weird one. As I understood our doc's explanation (in pen form) they need to be stored in a fridge unless in use, then has to be "room temperature" but thats what starts the expiration count down to 28 days... after brought out cant go back in and should never be in a place it can get warm or it can't be used at all... the whole thing confuses me
I would absolutely recommend you speak to a doctor or pharmacist to make sure insulin is used and stored correctly, but from what I understand refrigerated insulin is fine to use straight away, but will take longer to start working and will be uncomfortable or even painful to inject depending on how cold it is.
Do NOT use insulin if it has developed ice on the exterior, as it has gone below safe storage temperatures and is likely to be unsafe to use.
It is highly recommended you check the temperature of your fridge with a thermometer to ensure it is above the minimum storage temperature for insulin, and preferably if possible have a separate fridge purely for insulin storage, and keep the insulin away from the fridge walls or sides.
I've found that the best place for me is the shelves in the door as that is furthest away from the cooling elements and stops it from freezing.
High temperatures causes it to degrade, and the higher the temperature, the faster the degradation, generally you want to keep it around 25c or below when in active use.
It can be put back in the fridge once brought to room temperature. However, and I must strongly emphasise this, from what I have been told it does NOT extend the shelf life beyond the 28/30 day limit and should still be disposed of within the 28/30 days after first being brought to room temperature.
I believe it's recommended to return insulin to the fridge after use if you live in very hot climates and there's limited or no access to AC, and even if you don't you should still do this on days where the room temperature rises above 25c.
If your doctor or pharmacist has given you differing instructions to this, then follow their instructions and advice and do not follow mine, while I am type 1 diabetic and have been since I was 14, I am still not an expert and you should still listen to medical professionals and ask for clarification if you're still unsure.
@PaulTheFox1988 I really appreciate your comment. I'm still learning as my youngest was very recently was diagnosed with type 1...I bug the team of doctors all the time with questions yet the temp thing confuses me with the hot summer but I know for sure the expiration date can't be extended.
@@paige8916 I really sympathise with you and your youngest, it's a lot to take in and it is confusing, contradictory, and can change due to the evolving nature of the treatments available, but you're entering into this world at one of the best times even if it doesn't feel like it, the tools available will make managing it easier than it's ever been, I just hope the country you live in has them readily available and cheap to access.
One thing I suggest you do is try to get mental health support for both you and your youngest, especially for them. I didn't until much more recently and leaving it so long it caused me irreparable harm and I don't want that to happen to anyone else.
You're going to deal with a lot of ignorance and stigma and it is very difficult to deal with, and sadly there exists people who will try to manipulate you with promises of cures or dangerous ideas such as that insulin is not required, but no matter how much you or your youngest wish for it you should never listen to anyone trying to tell you these things.
I know you probably won't listen to anyone but a doctor, but I should still mention that conmen or stupid people exist and they will only cause devastating harm.
One more thing, don't buy any food item that claims to be specifically for diabetics without first speaking to a qualified dietician or diabetes specialist, these foods often replace sugar with alternatives that causes diarrhoea in large doses and this can cause serious issues.
I wish you both all the best, it's not a nice condition, it will never be easy, but you're not alone and the people you're already seeking advice from genuinely do care and are a wealth of knowledge you should never disregard. ❤️
In eastern Europe, we keep them in a Shoebox in the dining room, or in a drawer in the bedroom. Never heard of anyone keeping anything else but cream tubes in the bathroom
I have my medicine in a "lockbox" on the kitchen table. Quotes because you can get it open with a butter knife
I haven't kept any medicines in my bathroom medicine cabinet for decades because I heard about it not being a good place for them. I use that space for things like hairbrushes and combs, nail clippers, and so on
Thank you for putting clear actionable items at the end of this video! It is super helpful to have these science education videos tell us what we can do to incorporate the knowledge into our lives when the information does impact the lives of everyday people.
In my country, we never call the cabinet in the bathroom "medicine cabinet" but "mirror cabinet" or just bathroom cabinet. In fact, I don't personally know of anyone who actually stores meds in the bathroom
FDA knows what they're doing.
Supreme Court: No, we know better.
Look up the history of the FDA, and you are in for some suprises.
@@SeanBZA oh i know they were into some crap. We should be regulating our regulating agencies. Audits. Whistleblower protections. Etc
It’s too bad we only have the executive branch to execute the laws that already exist and the judicial branch to interpret them. If only there was a special 3rd branch that was responsible for actually writing new laws. Then we wouldn’t have executive agencies trying to put square pegs in 80 year old round holes and the court saying “no”.
We should get rid of all the regulating agencies and let people regulate their own lives.
@@KC9UDX Remove corporate personhood first, then you can do that.
My family had a medicine cabinet and stored medicine in it. But it was just a hallway cabinet, which was useful because chronic illnesses in the family meant that there was more in there than could fit behind a bathroom mirror
I've never heard anyone call it a medicine cabinet.. Just a cabinet.. Everyone I know stores their pills in the bedroom or the kitchen.
Mostly the older generation influenced by prohibition referred to it as a medicine cabinet cause they were developed as a place for hiding booze
Eta: in case it isn't obvious the medicine part refers to medicinal properties of liquor, paired with liquor cabinets being made illegal we got medicine cabinets
@@tengonadacluewhatsgutsprec1419 Ah I see, interesting tid bits
We have a Sterilite drawer thing on an upper shelf in the hall closet, each drawer is a different household member's meds, and it's high enough that the kids or cats can't reach... the door also has a lock on it (mostly because the cleaning chemicals are also kept in there).
We have zero medicine cabinets in our home.
Here in the UK those cabinets are used for storing spare toiletries like shampoo and things like spare tooth brushes etc. Also some doctors advise to keep some medications in the fridge.
About 50 odd years ago, I was a preschooler who had a cough being managed at home. I knew the cough syrup (yeah I know as an adult they don't do much) was stored in the cabinet in the bathroom. Mum was busy hanging clothes on the line, so I thought I'd not bother her by attending to it myself. I climbed up onto the edge of the bath, leaned on the basin and opened the cabinet door. I could just reach the top shelf that held the medicines. I climbed back down and I poured the dose into the little cup. My memory stops there. Years later, Mum made a comment when I moved out of home to not go drinking the furniture polish. She then explained that she noticed my breath smelt very strongly of something it shouldn't have, yet I was not upset at the time. She investigated the bathroom and found the opened bottle of "Marveer Furniture Polish", the medicine cup with still a half dose in it, and a vomited mess in the bath. She asked me about it and I owned up to it, she explained that it wasn't medicine and I agreed with her (the bottles had looked VERY similar) because it did not taste like it should have. She took me to the local hospital (we didn't have a house phone, early 70's) where they checked me over. They explained to Mum to keep cleaners in the laundry in a high place from kids, and to separate the medicines by storing them in the kitchen (because she spent a fair amount of time there daily) also in a high place away from heat. Over the next couple of days, Dad built Mum a lockable box to store cleaners in, the key being stored out of sight on the top of the cupboards. He also built a medicine box with a lock for the kitchen (but I don't know where that was stored). SO DON'T STORE STUFF WHERE IT DOESN'T BELONG AND KEEP IT OUT OF SIGHT AND REACH OF ALL KIDS!!!!
My medicine cabinet holds toothpaste, mouthwash, floss, a bottle of unused sunscreen, deodorant, face wash... oh, and a tiny jar of Vicks, which has been used maybe twice in the past five years. We generally keep our medicines in a cabinet in the kitchen as far from the stove and sink as it can get. I also keep some OTC meds (loratadine, diphenhydramine, acetaminophen, etc.) in my bedside table.
I have a medicine cabinet for something.....
My shaver (:
It's what I keep in mine
I’ve only ever heard it called a medicine cabinet in American tv shows and movies. Storing the medicine in the bathroom makes no sense to me. Ive only ever heard the bathroom cabinet called a bathroom cabinet or toiletries cabinet in Australia. We had a “medicine cabinet” in my childhood home but it was in the kitchen. I currently store my medicine in the bedside table
Why people do that on the first place? We have it in wardrobe/cabinet, on special shelf. Those someone in the family need to take daily, is kept on the kitchen in cabinet.
Originally intended to be a hidden cabinet for hiding booze AKA medicine during the prohibition
We keep ours on a Lazy Susan in a cabinet in the kitchen. And its on the opposite side from the stove and oven and sink
i have a medicine drawer that's dangerous for other reasons, I once accidentally took a cat antibiotic tablet instead of adhd meds because the pills went through the same type of press : )
Where I leave we do not have médecine in bottle anymore. Now each pill is packed separately and sealed in blister-packs. So even if you drop them in water it won’t be a problem. Only vitamins are still sold in bottle or tube.
I’d never call that thing a medicine cabinet. It’s a bathroom cabinet for storing bathroom things that aren’t out being used at the moment.
Medicine is kept in the kitchen. On a shelf in a cupboard high up where it’s not accessible to kids. I’ve never had drugs that need to be refrigerated.
Some pharmacies may even have drop boxes for you to dump expired or otherwise unneeded medication in.
I have a medicine shelf in my fridge.
I have a fridge shelf in my medicine cabinet!
Double check your meds' lower storage temperatures too. Cool is better than hot, but too cold can be a problem.
Humidity can still be a problem unless you have a fridge with de-humidification.
Aussie here 🇦🇺
We call them "bathroom cabinets" not medicine cabinets.
People store their medications all over the place. Usually in some form of drawer or the good old shortbread tin.
The medicine cabinet in the bathroom is out of the reach of small children.
And when the children are older, it is easy to explain to them that the contents of that cabinet is a no-no when an adult is not with them.
You should also keep cleaning products out of the way in a high place. Especially those cleaning products that looks like soda bottles.
Why are they even legal?
Behind the mirror in my medicine cabinet I keep the guy who lives in the other part of the duplex. Everyday he waits in his bathroom for me to open the cabinet where at first he looks surprised but then I realize he's just mocking me.
Next thing for you to cover: evaporation of things like isopropyl alcohol forming peroxide crystals.
My dad had a really old bottle of isopropyl alcohol in his medicine cabinet and noticed some crystals in the bottom. He didn't want to dump it down the sink because of his leech field or whatever that's called, so he dumped it out on some rocks next to the house and thought nothing of it.
Something like a month later, he was walking from A to B, through the rocks, and heard a loud bang. He thought he'd been shot at, and couldn't see out of one of his eyes.
The crystals on the rocks had exploded when he stepped on them, launching rock shrapnel up at him. One bit cracked the glass on his phone in his front pocket, another caught him in one of his knees, it messed up the shoe that stepped on them and, lastly, a piece hit him right above his eye, detaching his lense and causing some trauma to the retina, but luckily not damaging the eye itself.
The doctors and nurses didn't believe him, pulled him aside without my mom to run him through the DV questions to make sure. The doctor he had told came back in a bit later and said, "i looked it up. And now i believe you. 😮"
We're not sure the exact kind of peroxide crystals would have formed, and there wasn't really a way to investigate them to find out, but we're pretty sure that's what it was.
This is why you have to wear goggles in science labs, even if you're not really working with "dangerous" substances. Science is wild.
You can also call the 800 number on the packaging and ask for "excursion information". They will tell you how far outside the temp storage range a product can be kept and for how long. Make sure to have the barcode number handy or the NDC (National Drug Code) number from the front of the product and not just the name otherwise they can't help you.
5:35 I prefer MDMA… 😉
Room temp varies by climate too! Room temp in Alaska is different than Arizona, for example. Here in AZ most houses are 75-85F, which makes it difficult when you take meds that are supposed to stay below 70F and your house is 80F x.x
EDIT: I mean in summer. And i'm not including places with high elevation
The lowest upper bound on the suggested ranges given was 77ºF, the higher was 86ºF.
Double checking what you're saying, the highest I see anyone talking about setting the AC in Arizona is 80ºF, most are closer to mid-70s, some are saying the same 70-low 70s figure that's normal elsewhere.
@@seigeengine ah, I see the problem. I mean in summer, which I forgot was relevant lol. Editing that now.
I've never met anybody personally who kept theirs below 78, though my friends have mentioned others before, and the high end depends on the quality of a/c if they have it, as well as personal preference of course.
In winter it varies massively.
@@seigeengine also I have at least one medication that says something like 68-72
@@HmmmmmLemmeThinkNo ... Of course we're talking about the summer?
I've always kept my meds on my desk in my room only things I keep in the medicine cabinet are like bandaids and gauze
I did shelf life studies as a chemist, I loved it !!
We call it a pharmacy cabinet and ours is at the top of the stairs when coming up from the garage. It's about 17°C there all year round and the humidity is somewhat controlled by 3 ventilators spaced throughout the walls of the garage.
Some of my medications are in the kitchen, so I can take it in the morning when I make coffee. Other meds are hidden in a cupboard, in a locked metal box, in my room. It's a weekly med that I have to keep secure.
I bet that the average temperature and humidity in a medicine cabinet is completely indistinguishable from any other cabinet you have in your house
My medications are in my dresser drawer in an air-conditioned room. I did know to not store medications in the bathroom, by the stove/oven, or on a windowsill, but it's nice to know why. 😊
We keep most of our medicines in our night stands next to the bed. My wife is Type 1 so she does have Insulin, but we refrigerate that. Between that and the cost of food in California when the power goes out the fridge is priority for backup power.
There's a Chinese saying "medicine is 30 percent poison," and has multiple meanings. Improper storage is just 1 of the ways a pill can be bad for you, please check with a doctor or pharmacist *before* taking any medicines as there are even slight differences between brands of the same pills, like ibuprofen.
In my country, medications legally have to be dispensed in blister packs and honestly they’re pretty great. Yes they can be a bit fiddly, especially when taking multiple pills but the blister packs keep them safe from humidity, tampering and have been found to increase people’s consistency in taking prescribed medications. They also help reduce the risk of intentional or accidental overdose (especially in children) and it’s easier to keep track of how many you have left. I’m happy to have them, even if it slightly increases the time it takes to sort them.
Here in the UK we call it a "bathroom cabinet". Not the most imaginative I'll grant you, but it works. I'm sure there are people who do store medication in there, but it's not the norm.
This is why I store my medicine in one of the kitchen cabinets. 'Store dry and cool.' It's basically on every medicine ever, unless it needs to be kept in the fridge of course.
Just as well ranitidine is gone - it also has another problem where it greatly potentiates the effects of alcohol consumption. Never saw a warning on the packaging for that one
My dad wasn't an alcohol drinker, but he did have a gallbladder attack and I wonder if that was related to the Zantac.
That's why I keep them in the half bath (sink & toilet only) medicine cabinet, not the full bath medicine cabinets (it has 2 for some odd reason), but that's where toothpaste, cleanser stuff, and other things are kept. I used to work in a pharmacy.
We have a dedicated shelf in the hall/towel closet. Glad to know we accidentally picked a good spot.
I have a medicine cabinet. It's filled with extra soap, extra toilet paper, toothbrushes, & toothpaste. No medicine.
We built a cabinet for our meds with help from a friend and put it in the kitchen away from the stove and sink. Works great.
I have cupboards in my bathroom, I keep spare toilet paper rolls and cleaning products and bath products and room deodorant whatever it’s called in them.
I keep medications in a dedicated cupboard for them, and sewing stuff and sunscreen.
This was a big part of my 35 year career... the storage temperature ranges mentioned are meaningless, because expiry etc completely depends on the packaging... and fun fact, tablet studies are done in bulk packaging (except for blisters), so who knows what the real shelf-life is in the less protective dispensed bottles which are literally never studied. I could go on, but I can sense eyes glazing over...