Pill Splitting

Dough White: Hi I'm pharmacist Dough White, inside the medicine chest. Do you have a problem swallowing pills; many people are splitting their pills because it's easier to swallow, and it might be easier on the wall it, but that's not always a good idea, many pills can be safely split, when it depends up on the coating and how it reacts in the body.

There are some drugs like heart medications that can be split, because of a specific dose, if you cut them off evenly you may not get the right dose at the right time. There are some time release tablets like calcium 10 is that can be cut, is because of the coating on a tablet that makes the time release mechanism work. One handy way to see if you pill can be split and still look at its name if the name of your medication ends in that ER, SR, XL or CD it's probably a time release medication and it would be a known to split these drugs. If the pieces are too hard to swallow some people will try to crush up the medication, but the same rules apply as an pills like, if you crush your time release tablets all the medication may go into the blood stream at the one time, where it is actually designed to be over a 24 hour of period of time, if you have any questions whether your tablets can be crushed ask your pharmacist. I'm dough white inside the medicine chest.


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