By Mark Harvey
Everybody ought to have a hobby, right?
Back in the day, people had hobbies like collecting doilies, or whittling, or assembling ships in bottles, or emptying bottles on ships.
Of course, that was all back in the same “day” that prescription drugs were relatively uncommon. Sure, many of us would get one once in a while, and some of us had quite a few sometimes, but they weren’t something that took a tremendous amount of time to manage.
But then prescription drugs became hobbies! Well, OK, that is a bit facetious, but here’s what I mean: We all started living longer, so we started needing more prescriptions to keep us living longer, and all kinds of new drugs were helping us to live longer — and some drugs require other drugs to make sure the drugs that help us to live longer don’t kill us. Basically, we gave up suffering as a national pastime (read: hobby).
And, yes, I am still being facetious. Certainly, drugs bring their own set of problems and concerns with them, and certainly here are plenty of us who don’t want anything to do with prescription drugs, no matter what. In fact, some of those folks rely upon (and, in some cases, quite successfully) various herbal preparations and over-the-counter supplements, etc., to help them avoid drugs.
Fair enough.
The fact remains, however, that in 2017 a lot of us are taking a lot of prescription drugs and/or supplements and/or herbals and/or nutritional interventions and/or whatever else, to the extent that “managing” them has become (of necessity) our hobby.
Now, I’m not suggesting we shouldn’t be doing what we’re doing, or that these things aren’t good, or that they don’t work, because most of us know better. But I am suggesting that managing all this stuff can get pretty darned complicated.
First, we have to get whatever it is, then we have to attempt to read directions and warnings that are printed in fonts and sizes designed by and for Lilliputians, then we have to remember when to take what and how (with or without food, water, sunlight, oxygen or facing east), assuming we can even open the container. (Question: Why does it take three strong men, two chainsaws and an angry mule to open arthritis medication?) Then, we’d better be taking the right one(s) at the right time(s) in the right way(s) for as long as instructed.
And all of this is assuming, of course, that we can afford said substance, but that’s a rant for another day.
Kinda makes you long for the days of doilies, huh?
Well, it’s too late for that. We are where we are; and the truth is, of course, that a lot of us wouldn’t be alive, or wouldn’t be having a “life,” if we didn’t take what we need to take, when we need to take it. So we’d better figure all of this out, right?
Right. And that can be easier said than done. I’ve thought to myself on more than one occasion: “Self, what you need is to be able to sit down with somebody who knows what they’re talking about (and isn’t trying to sell me something) and get some advice on how to handle all these drugs/supplements/substances so they’ll do what I want them to do and not take me out, in the process!”
Apparently, someone was listening, because the Olympic Area Agency on Aging is putting on three free Medication Awareness Workshops in the next couple of weeks.
Did you catch the “free” part? OK.
So, what exactly is a Medication Awareness Workshop? A real, live, no-kidding pharmacist will talk to us about how to manage our medications, etc., how to decrease our medication risks and how to reduce our fall risks. (Note: Falls will take more of us out of play than Alzheimer’s, so think about that.)
Then we could sign up right there for a 30-minute consultation with the pharmacist to review our personal situations. All we have to do is bring all of our medications (prescription and over-the-counter), supplements, etc., in a bag (or a suitcase, or a dump truck) — or a list of them — and then listen and take notes.
Here are the dates:
• June 6, 11 a.m. to noon at the Raymond Senior Center, 324 Jackson Ave.
• June 9, 11 a.m. to noon at the Hoquiam Senior Center, 707 Simpson Ave.
• June 12, 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. at the North Beach Senior Center, 885 Ocean Shores Blvd. NW, in Ocean Shores.
You don’t have to bring seven pounds of insurance paperwork or listen to any sell jobs. Just show up, pay attention, then go have your life. Why wouldn’t we do this?
I don’t know, unless we had to go whittle doilies.…
Mark Harvey is the director of information and assistance for the Olympic Area Agency on Aging. He can be reached by email at harvemb@dshs.wa.gov; by phone at 360-532-0520 in Aberdeen, 360-942-2177 in Raymond, or 360-642-3634; or through Facebook at Olympic Area Agency on Aging-Information & Assistance.
