Hearts at Home Care

There are a number of things you can do to make sure you take the right medicine, in the right dose at the right time.

• Get into a routine of taking your medicines at the same time each day. Repeating this activity on a daily basis will create a memorable ritual rather like brushing your teeth after breakfast and before bedtime.

• If you would like your care worker to remind you, ask the field supervisor to include this in your care and support plan.

• Make a note to remind yourself or create a chart showing when you need to take each medicine and how it must be taken. Use a colour coding system to distinguish different times of the day. For example, yellow for morning, green for lunchtime, blue for dinnertime and red for bedtime. Recording each time you take your medicine on a simple medication log can help you to keep track of whether you have taken your medicines. If you have a care worker, these notes will help them to know when you are due another dose.

• Keep your medicines in an obvious place. For example, if you need to take thyroxine before breakfast and you always have a cup of tea first thing in the morning, put the tablets next to the kettle.

• If you regularly take several tablets each day, your pharmacist may be able to supply you with a monitored dosage system. This is a system that groups your tablets for each day in sealed containers.

• Set your mobile phone alarm or use timer caps for bottles that beep when it’s time to take a tablet