LUBBOCK, Texas (KCBD) – You have a chance this weekend to do something good for your family, the community and the environment. It’s time for the Fall Medication Cleanout, hosted by the Texas Panhandle Poison Center, managed by the Texas Tech University School of Pharmacy.

Ronica Farrar, program manager for the TPPC says, “We’ve had 27,655 cars come through and collected over 95,000 pounds.”

New or old, the Medication Cleanout provides a free and easy way to get rid of all those prescriptions or over the counter drugs sitting unused in your medicine cabinet. Just put them in a bag or box and drive over to the TTUHSC parking lot in Lubbock this Saturday.

Farrar says, “Follow the signs to go through the drive through. Even if the line looks long, it moves really quickly and we’ll get to you very fast.”

Trained volunteers will be standing by to take your medications.

Farrar explains, “The first question we’re going to ask is, do you have any sharps, anything that’s going to poke us?”

They will dispose of old needles, too. But please put those in a container for safe handling.

In the 96 events like this in Lubbock, Abilene and Amarillo, Farrar says we’ll never know how many lives have been saved by this effort to destroy unused or old medication. She says it’s hard to measure something that doesn’t happen, but we know medication disposal is critical in preventing accidental poisonings.

Even when a drug is expired, she says it could still contain an ingredient that poses a deadly threat to children and adults. Also, drugs that are flushed away can contaminate our water supply or harm wildlife.

One big request if you join the Medication Cleanout, she says please keep the drugs in their original containers because they are sorted before they are disposed. And don’t worry if you forget to cross your name out, they’ll do it for you to make sure your identify is protected.

“So the name, the RX number, if there’s an address on there, we occlude that with a paint pen and then that also is incinerated.”

The Fall Medication Cleanout is Saturday, Oct. 4, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the parking lot outside the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at 3601 4th Street, near Indiana.

For more information, go to www.medicationcleanout.com

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