The Dangers of Mixing Medications

When you have surgery, your doctor will prescribe several different medications for you to take afterwards while you are recovering.
 
About once or twice a week, my patient will bring a bag of prescriptions in and not know how to take them, or even what they are for. Especially with generics, the brand name is sometimes not on the bottle, so it can be more confusing.
 
Many surgeons will prescribe: antibiotics and pain medication such as Vicodin. Sometimes patients will also have prescriptions for Valium, Ambien, Dalmane, or Xanax.
 
I usually write on the bottle what the medications are for and when to take them. Some are only as needed…but many people think that they need to take it every 6 hours or whatever is written. Usually, the only one that needs to be entirely finished is the antibiotic.
 
The dangerous part about having such a different assortment of medications is to be aware not to mix pain meds, anti-anxiety meds, and sleep meds together.
 
We have all heard about so many celebrities accidentally overdosing on medications that were prescribed to them.
 
It is important to take time to assess where your discomfort is coming from. Is it isolated pain from the surgery site, or do you feel anxiety? Is it late at night and you really don’t have pain but are having a hard time sleeping due to body positioning?
 
Make sure that if you are taking something for pain, sleep, anxiety that you space them out 6 hours apart, or exclude what you don’t need altogether.
 
Too many drugs at one time can depress your breathing respirations, and people fall into such a deep sleep that they then have problems awakening.
 
So… remember to listen to your body and not over-medicate yourself. Be aware of how you are feeling, keep a list of what time you took medications and also let your caregiver know.
 
And, by all means, never mix alcohol with your meds!