Ouch, cramps

[prettygolucky.livejournal.com]

Help! I have cramps from hell and the only Midol in the house has an expiration date of 04/05. I know nothing about medication and what happens to it after it expires; is it at ALL safe to take this stuff or not? I know that's a stupid question, but I'm just so desperate at this point.

Comments

[smallstar.livejournal.com]

The expiration date on a medication only tells you how long the pharmaceutical company is willing to guarantee the effectiveness of a particular drug. It doesn't actually tell you anything about how long the drug is truly good for. Testing done by the US military has shown that about 90% of the drugs they have stockpiled are still good several years after their expiration date. Most drugs gradually break down with time, and some period of time they might be less effective, but still safe. The only drug known to actually become harmful after its expiry date is tetracycline. For drugs where getting the exact dose of the medication is really important (eg. oral contraceptives, heart medications, blood thinners, etc.) it's probably best to take them only before their expiry date. Also, some formulations like liquid antibiotics have pretty short shelf lives and shouldn't be taken after their expiry dates. For drugs like over-the-counter painkillers and the like, it's probably safe to take them after the expiration date.

References:
http://www.usaweekend.com/05_issues/050710/050710healthsmart.html
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/460159
http://www.mercola.com/2000/apr/2/drug_expiration.htm

[prettygolucky.livejournal.com]

Ahh, thank you muchly. I've always wondered about the expiration date on over-the-counter medication, since my mother has always said it's okay to take after the expiration date, but I always love to get a second opinion. Thanks for the references and all; that really helped. :)

[smallstar.livejournal.com]

You're welcome. I enjoyed looking it up - I've always wondered that myself, and those articles (particularly the last one) were really interesting.

[frolicnaked.livejournal.com]

I remember one time, in one of my high school chemistry classes, we worked through a problem wherein we learned that when some OTC pain reliever -- I want to say acetaminophen because it's what I remember and because it seems reasonable -- breaks down, it starts to form acetic acid, the same acid that's in vinegar. Because I'm weird like that, this is one of those useless tidbits I remember.

When I went off to college, my mom got me a big-ass bottle of generic acetaminophen, which I barely used at all. (My pain tends to respond better to ibuprofen.) The bottle was mostly full even well after its expiration date. When I moved out to AZ -- 5 years later -- I opened the bottle just once before deciding whether to throw it away. Sure enough, it smelled very strongly of vinegar.

[smallstar.livejournal.com]

Neat. :) Yay, chemistry.