Johns Hopkins Hospital helps combat prescription drug misuse through 'take back' initiative

BALTIOMRE -- The old medication that lies around your home can be harmful if it gets in the wrong hands.

Johns Hopkins Hospital is taking part in the fight against the misuse of prescription medications, many of which continue to fuel the nation's opioid epidemic.

"Medications that folks don't need anymore is one of the ways that can keep them safe if we get it out of the house," Julie Waldfogel, Clinical Pharmacy Specialist, said. "If we think about family, friends, or kids getting into the medications, we need to make sure that they get out of the house as soon as possible, and we reduce risk by making sure we only keep medicines in the house that we need."

And they've made the process easy, just drop your medications off, no questions asked.

"We will take them in hand, we will de-identify them, and dispose of the medications separately," Waldfogel said.

Teams collected tablets, capsules, liquids, creams, e-cigarettes, vape pens, needles, and more.

"A lot of folks have been bringing boxes, clearly, things have been piling up for people, and they have needed this way to get rid of them," Waldfogel explained.

All 23 state police barracks also participated in Drug Take Back Day. During the last event in October, the DEA collected more than 10 thousand pounds of unwanted drugs at 110 collection sites in Maryland.