So many little bottles. So, so many.
October 27, 2016 10:44 PM Subscribe
How do you store your household medicines so you can see everything you have easily? We have so many little bottles of pills and stuff that I always have trouble finding what I'm looking for, which is extremely not fun when it's an urgent need. It also means a ton of waste, as we're always buying dupes of things we've got but couldn't find. How do other households deal with this?
I don't even know why - we've been mostly pretty healthy - but for some reason, the quantity of bottles of pills and other such stuff in my house is just... I mean it is bonkers. OTC medicines, prescriptions we still need to keep handy, random lotions and unguents and bandages and splints and ahhhh SO MUCH STUFF. I need to have it displayed so that I can see, at once, what I'm looking for. Currently it's in a combination of deep shelves and drawers and I can't find anything. It's a giant mess.
The good news is I have almost an entire closet in the vanity area which I can, with some work, dedicate to solving this problem, but I need to figure out the most efficient and effective way. Thought I'd check and see if anyone here has brilliant solutions to this issue before I start reinventing the wheel. What does your household do with this stuff?
I don't even know why - we've been mostly pretty healthy - but for some reason, the quantity of bottles of pills and other such stuff in my house is just... I mean it is bonkers. OTC medicines, prescriptions we still need to keep handy, random lotions and unguents and bandages and splints and ahhhh SO MUCH STUFF. I need to have it displayed so that I can see, at once, what I'm looking for. Currently it's in a combination of deep shelves and drawers and I can't find anything. It's a giant mess.
The good news is I have almost an entire closet in the vanity area which I can, with some work, dedicate to solving this problem, but I need to figure out the most efficient and effective way. Thought I'd check and see if anyone here has brilliant solutions to this issue before I start reinventing the wheel. What does your household do with this stuff?
Best answer: This is what Pinterest is good for. You'll find dozens of ideas there.
I envy your big closet. Good luck.
posted by toastedbeagle at 11:18 PM on October 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
I envy your big closet. Good luck.
posted by toastedbeagle at 11:18 PM on October 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
I've found the little turntables (lazy Susan's) that one usually finds in a kitchen to be a godsend when used in the deep shelves in my bathroom. I just spin, et voila there is the thing I need.
posted by susiswimmer at 11:28 PM on October 27, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by susiswimmer at 11:28 PM on October 27, 2016 [4 favorites]
I solved this by:
- Purchasing wooden (fairly attractive) medicine cabinet and mounting it in a hallway. This type of cabinet is helpful because the shelves are shallow, so you don't get the problem of bottles behind other bottles. They are also useful for other small items. Nobody says you can only have one medicine cabinet in a bathroom. (also, lots of things do better stored in a less moist environment.
- Cutting and mounting additional shelves inside the medicine cabinets. Lots of items are not as tall as regular prescription bottles, and lots of items are much taller. You can make as many shelves as you want at whatever heights you want. If the cabinets you have use little metal peg-like shelf supports, hey, you can get more of those easily at a hardware store. Wood shelves can be cut from the 1/4" or 1/2" "craft" wood from the hardware (or even craft) store; glass shelves can be cut and the edges smoothed by a glass supplier for much less money than you'd think.
This has made a huge difference. Having a couple of 1.5"-high shelves in the cabinets is wonderful, and having shelves just the right height for prescription bottles helps a lot too. There's a lot less wasted space -- a _lot_ less -- and so what is stored is much more accessible.
Every medicine cabinet here has two additional shelves (they came with two shelves, so they have four shelves total). It seems a much more useful configuration.
posted by amtho at 11:49 PM on October 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
- Purchasing wooden (fairly attractive) medicine cabinet and mounting it in a hallway. This type of cabinet is helpful because the shelves are shallow, so you don't get the problem of bottles behind other bottles. They are also useful for other small items. Nobody says you can only have one medicine cabinet in a bathroom. (also, lots of things do better stored in a less moist environment.
- Cutting and mounting additional shelves inside the medicine cabinets. Lots of items are not as tall as regular prescription bottles, and lots of items are much taller. You can make as many shelves as you want at whatever heights you want. If the cabinets you have use little metal peg-like shelf supports, hey, you can get more of those easily at a hardware store. Wood shelves can be cut from the 1/4" or 1/2" "craft" wood from the hardware (or even craft) store; glass shelves can be cut and the edges smoothed by a glass supplier for much less money than you'd think.
This has made a huge difference. Having a couple of 1.5"-high shelves in the cabinets is wonderful, and having shelves just the right height for prescription bottles helps a lot too. There's a lot less wasted space -- a _lot_ less -- and so what is stored is much more accessible.
Every medicine cabinet here has two additional shelves (they came with two shelves, so they have four shelves total). It seems a much more useful configuration.
posted by amtho at 11:49 PM on October 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
A label maker to print out the names of the medications (Rx and OTC) in large clear type is very helpful for rapidly scanning the meds shelves, especially if you get confused about generic vs. brand name (my husband is terminally incapable of remembering Tylenol is acetaminophen).
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:01 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:01 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
I do the plastic bin, plus I had sparkly cellophane tape left over from Christmas wrapping, in four colors, which I use to mark the lids of particular prescription bottles I need to find quickly, or to mark ones that are almost empty. When I have multiple bottles of the same medication I rubber band them together.
posted by XMLicious at 1:04 AM on October 28, 2016 [7 favorites]
posted by XMLicious at 1:04 AM on October 28, 2016 [7 favorites]
Best answer: I also do plastic bins. We've got allergy meds, cold/flu, tummy meds, pain meds, plus a first aid kit that's pretty well stocked.
posted by pecanpies at 3:58 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by pecanpies at 3:58 AM on October 28, 2016
I've got a lot of prescription bottles to deal with. Provided you don't need to keep everything out of reach, I'd recommend drawers, with labels written at the top of the bottles.
posted by steady-state strawberry at 4:09 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by steady-state strawberry at 4:09 AM on October 28, 2016
Anything meant for storing spice bottles works for this.
posted by PuppetMcSockerson at 4:58 AM on October 28, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by PuppetMcSockerson at 4:58 AM on October 28, 2016 [4 favorites]
Thirding/fourthing the bins by illness type, and we've added a bin in the kitchen for 'I'm sick foods' like powdered Gatorade, crackers of various types, mac and cheese, canned and instant soup. It is an excellent thing to have when you're feeling like crap.
posted by larthegreat at 5:08 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by larthegreat at 5:08 AM on October 28, 2016
Nthing bins organized/labeled by ailment.
posted by mama casserole at 5:09 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by mama casserole at 5:09 AM on October 28, 2016
I do big labeled Ziploc bags, but before the bottles go in, they get a yellow highlighter run over the drug name and the date it was prescribed. I tend to remember what each drug is for, but sometimes i'll scrawl on the cap what it was prescribed for.
posted by rachaelfaith at 5:38 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by rachaelfaith at 5:38 AM on October 28, 2016
Maybe you all have way more medication, but I take like 20 pills a day, with five people in our house, and all our meds storage would fit on one small bathroom shelf.
We have small bins for daily use with what needs to be used that week neatly portioned out. As it gets used up, replaced from a larger bin kept on a very high shelf (if you don't have kids, you could use a drawer) with the regular supply which gets checked for restocking before doctor's appointments/pharmacy runs. These small bins are like 6"x2"x4" deep and I'll put a single strip of meds in them, discarding packaging. They're just right for a tube of ointment to stand upright in.
I split my larger bins 10"x4"x4" deep into my own meds and regular household meds (headache, fever, burn salve etc), but that's because I have huge prescriptions. Some boxes in their original packaging are stacked up by kind next to those boxes until they rotate in, and I know I'm running low.
I do have a go-bag for cuts and burns, which is just a zipper plastic bag full of bandaids, burn salve, antibacterial salves etc, and kept in an accessible drawer so it can be grabbed when someone injures themselves without having to hunt through the medicines.
The biggest difference for me was getting rid of a lot of expired stuff and putting everything else into a storage place meant for medicine (check the instructions - bathrooms can be too humid/light for medicine storage in some cases) and keeping what I actually needed to hand.
Refilling the weekly basket makes it a lot easier to see what's getting used and keep the boxes tidy.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 6:10 AM on October 28, 2016
We have small bins for daily use with what needs to be used that week neatly portioned out. As it gets used up, replaced from a larger bin kept on a very high shelf (if you don't have kids, you could use a drawer) with the regular supply which gets checked for restocking before doctor's appointments/pharmacy runs. These small bins are like 6"x2"x4" deep and I'll put a single strip of meds in them, discarding packaging. They're just right for a tube of ointment to stand upright in.
I split my larger bins 10"x4"x4" deep into my own meds and regular household meds (headache, fever, burn salve etc), but that's because I have huge prescriptions. Some boxes in their original packaging are stacked up by kind next to those boxes until they rotate in, and I know I'm running low.
I do have a go-bag for cuts and burns, which is just a zipper plastic bag full of bandaids, burn salve, antibacterial salves etc, and kept in an accessible drawer so it can be grabbed when someone injures themselves without having to hunt through the medicines.
The biggest difference for me was getting rid of a lot of expired stuff and putting everything else into a storage place meant for medicine (check the instructions - bathrooms can be too humid/light for medicine storage in some cases) and keeping what I actually needed to hand.
Refilling the weekly basket makes it a lot easier to see what's getting used and keep the boxes tidy.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 6:10 AM on October 28, 2016
We have a big closet just outside our bathroom, so most of its shelves are dedicated to various linens, but the most accessible eye-level shelf is our "medicine cabinet." Nthing the "bin by ailment type" thing: allergies, cuts {bandaids and Neosporin}, cough/cold, digestive, pain relief, vitamins, and topical. Lotions I keep separately on a shelf next to the shower because they're used at least 2x daily.
posted by Pandora Kouti at 6:20 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by Pandora Kouti at 6:20 AM on October 28, 2016
We have a drawer just deep enough to stand up most prescription bottles and many OTC vials, so the lids are labeled in sharpie marker. That drawer is only for allergy/cold, and prescriptions that are intermittent - active prescriptions and painkillers are in the bathroom mirror cabinet, and there's a tackle-box full of all the first aid things (bandaids and neosporin, as well as knee braces and ace bandages) in the linen cabinet, which is handy to grab the box and head downstairs to where the person who cut themselves is crying in the kitchen.
I am liking the idea of separating things out into bins, and may give that a shot, but I think we'll still have a quick-grab shelf over the sink.
posted by aimedwander at 7:07 AM on October 28, 2016
I am liking the idea of separating things out into bins, and may give that a shot, but I think we'll still have a quick-grab shelf over the sink.
posted by aimedwander at 7:07 AM on October 28, 2016
Our meds and the like are stored in different places. Prescriptions are in one cabinet, arrayed in a plastic basket, for easy apportionment into the daily pill containers. A single drawer in the bathroom holds all the first aid items, while OTC meds are in the medicine cabinet. If that isn't workable for you, I'd bet the arrangement I've developed for spices would be: The spice bottles are stored in cutlery trays and there is a planogram posted on the inside of the cabinet door showing where each bottle is.
posted by DrGail at 7:22 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by DrGail at 7:22 AM on October 28, 2016
I use the plastic bin system, with First Aid in the hall bathroom and pills in a kitchen cabinet. There are two kitchen boxes - one for vitamins and "stomach drugs" (antacid, immodium, etc) - and the other for our frequently used stuff like ibuprofen and allergy/cold medicines.
Lotions (like lip balms and tissues) are distributed around the house to where they get used. All my skincare stuff is (kinda) organized in one box in my bathroom. "Special" skin stuff, like sunburn/aloe and neosporin and other creams, go with the First Aid box.
posted by Lyn Never at 7:58 AM on October 28, 2016
Lotions (like lip balms and tissues) are distributed around the house to where they get used. All my skincare stuff is (kinda) organized in one box in my bathroom. "Special" skin stuff, like sunburn/aloe and neosporin and other creams, go with the First Aid box.
posted by Lyn Never at 7:58 AM on October 28, 2016
SpiceStack with labels? We use these in the kitchen and they really do make our cooking life easier. I'd imagine they'd be equally helpful for pill bottles.
posted by onecircleaday at 8:01 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by onecircleaday at 8:01 AM on October 28, 2016
I have plastic bins more or less organized by issue. I actually have one that I call the "problem bin"...it's for stuff you need when you have a problem -- band-aids, blister-covers, medicines, thermometer. I keep prescription meds elsewhere and put them into a little pill-organizer each week. But most importantly, I keep my headache, menstrual pain, and nausea medicines separate from all the other random OTC stuff, in a drawer in my dining room. Basically, the stuff that I need when I'm feeling like total crap, I want accessible and easy without having to sort through anything because oh god, I feel like crap, and I want those pills NOW.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 8:07 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 8:07 AM on October 28, 2016
Rx stuff I need regularly travels in a wicker basket with a handle so it comes to the right floor with me. (I'm not really a senior citizen, but, you know, never hurts to practice...)
First aid stuff lives in a wooden box made to fit perfectly on top of a toilet tank. (We, uh, we close our toilet before flushing and it's a thick box...)
OTC meds for anybody and everybody are in the kitchen, where I think most people might put spices. (Spices are in a drawer, in plastic boxes roughly divided by cuisine.) This is great; loads of meds say "store in a cool dry place" which is never the bathroom, and if you have an ailing houseguest you can say "kitchen cupboard over the tea" and let them rummage and select instead of letting them look at your prescriptions for embarrassing things. Also, it's next to food and drink so certain young fussbudgets can take their cold syrup and have the sixteen things they need to eat and drink to get rid of the terrible awful taste queued up, and the dosing thing is easily chucked in the dishwasher.
The cabinet is very narrow, like a sort of large medicine cabinet, so nothing gets lost in the back. Find a gorgeous medicine cabinet, put it in your kitchen? I'm never going back to keeping medicine in the bathroom; it's been so much more convenient to have it in the kitchen.
posted by kmennie at 8:45 AM on October 28, 2016
First aid stuff lives in a wooden box made to fit perfectly on top of a toilet tank. (We, uh, we close our toilet before flushing and it's a thick box...)
OTC meds for anybody and everybody are in the kitchen, where I think most people might put spices. (Spices are in a drawer, in plastic boxes roughly divided by cuisine.) This is great; loads of meds say "store in a cool dry place" which is never the bathroom, and if you have an ailing houseguest you can say "kitchen cupboard over the tea" and let them rummage and select instead of letting them look at your prescriptions for embarrassing things. Also, it's next to food and drink so certain young fussbudgets can take their cold syrup and have the sixteen things they need to eat and drink to get rid of the terrible awful taste queued up, and the dosing thing is easily chucked in the dishwasher.
The cabinet is very narrow, like a sort of large medicine cabinet, so nothing gets lost in the back. Find a gorgeous medicine cabinet, put it in your kitchen? I'm never going back to keeping medicine in the bathroom; it's been so much more convenient to have it in the kitchen.
posted by kmennie at 8:45 AM on October 28, 2016
1: Time for a purge. Go through everything and check the dates. Toss expired stuff and dispose of safely. Not in garbage or down toilet. Back to the pharmacy. This includes prescriptions that have run their course. Resist he urge to self prescribe by getting rid of prescription drugs that you're not taking on the advice of your Dr.
2) For the love of god, don't take things out of their original container. Those containers are designed that way for a reason. It's labelled correctly, and kept clean and dry, and unopenable by little kids' hands. In the event of an adverse reaction, poisoning, etc, you don't want to be bringing a baggie to the ER.
3) The sorting by illness thing sounds pretty good. You will also likely find that you have a lots of similar meds.
4) Is this a organization issue, or a buying issue, or both? You may have lots of painkillers, cough medicine, etc where the active ingredients are quite similar to one another and will both safely work for the same ailment. Recognizing this may help you reduce buying meds you don't need when you've got something at home that is safe and suitable. Or you may find that you have the name brand and the generic of the same med. Don't consolidate the pills, but there's no point in going out to replace one when it runs out.
posted by thenormshow at 9:28 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
2) For the love of god, don't take things out of their original container. Those containers are designed that way for a reason. It's labelled correctly, and kept clean and dry, and unopenable by little kids' hands. In the event of an adverse reaction, poisoning, etc, you don't want to be bringing a baggie to the ER.
3) The sorting by illness thing sounds pretty good. You will also likely find that you have a lots of similar meds.
4) Is this a organization issue, or a buying issue, or both? You may have lots of painkillers, cough medicine, etc where the active ingredients are quite similar to one another and will both safely work for the same ailment. Recognizing this may help you reduce buying meds you don't need when you've got something at home that is safe and suitable. Or you may find that you have the name brand and the generic of the same med. Don't consolidate the pills, but there's no point in going out to replace one when it runs out.
posted by thenormshow at 9:28 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
We solved this in our house! We use something like this except our model isn't an over-the-door deal. It's just fastened to the wall inside the closet in our bathroom. One shelf for stomach upset, one for cold/flu/cough/allergies, one for first aid, and so on.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 10:04 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 10:04 AM on October 28, 2016
Small bottles/jars with lids go into a basket/tray with the lids pointing up. Use a sharpie or other marker to write the name of the item on the lid for quick ID. I do this with spice bottles! The good news is that sharpie also makes silver markers that show up nicely on black/dark lids.
posted by VioletU at 10:18 AM on October 28, 2016
posted by VioletU at 10:18 AM on October 28, 2016
I use an over-the-door shoe organizer of clear plastic. Lots of little pouches to sort things by type, you can see everything inside, and you don't have to worry about knocking everything over when you're fishing for a particular thing.
posted by ananci at 11:31 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by ananci at 11:31 AM on October 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
I write the drug names on the bottle caps and store them upright in a drawer. Most of the time when I switch to a new bottle of a drug, I can just put the old cap on the new bottle. If it won't fit, I use a fine-point permanent marker to mark the new lid. Labels would also work if you're a label-lover.
posted by wryly at 12:54 PM on October 28, 2016
posted by wryly at 12:54 PM on October 28, 2016
Response by poster: update: at first I wanted to do something out of clear plastic shoe organizers - that's what I have in the utility room for small tools, and honestly our life is SO MUCH better since I put that up. But there was simply too much stuff for that solution here.
So what I did, I ripped out the existing closet hardware (which was just the standard hanging rod with one high shelf) and put in a Rubbermaid system with one short hanging rod up high on one side (for bathrobes etc) and lots of shallow melamine shelves on the other side. I got a bunch of low plastic baskets (18 so far and counting) at the dollar store and labeled them.
The system is still being refined - the cold/flu and travel/antibacterials baskets are overflowing - but I LOVE it. So damn happy every time I look at it. I can find everything, and I can put everything away in its right place! Skin! Soap! Pain! Indigestion! Tissues/Cottonballs! Hair doodads! There's even room for Noncosmetic Misc, where the inevitable matches, coins and pens wind up. If anyone wants a picture of this splendor, memail me. I want to share the love.
posted by fingersandtoes at 9:44 AM on November 2, 2016 [3 favorites]
So what I did, I ripped out the existing closet hardware (which was just the standard hanging rod with one high shelf) and put in a Rubbermaid system with one short hanging rod up high on one side (for bathrobes etc) and lots of shallow melamine shelves on the other side. I got a bunch of low plastic baskets (18 so far and counting) at the dollar store and labeled them.
The system is still being refined - the cold/flu and travel/antibacterials baskets are overflowing - but I LOVE it. So damn happy every time I look at it. I can find everything, and I can put everything away in its right place! Skin! Soap! Pain! Indigestion! Tissues/Cottonballs! Hair doodads! There's even room for Noncosmetic Misc, where the inevitable matches, coins and pens wind up. If anyone wants a picture of this splendor, memail me. I want to share the love.
posted by fingersandtoes at 9:44 AM on November 2, 2016 [3 favorites]
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posted by foxfirefey at 10:57 PM on October 27, 2016