DOES PILL SPLITTING NECESSARY?

A question that came into the mind of many of us is why some of us need to split the use of our medicines not in accordance with manufacturer’s correct dosage. But the trend is going that way.

People living in a remote places and thus very poor whose income is not enough to their daily needs are more prone to splitting of pills for their medical condition.

The only reason of such act is the desire to save extra money from the cost of medicines. The price of branded medicines is quite high. The total cost of medicines can make a man out of his budget and can no longer manage to support the mounting expenses during the period of recuperation. This is the time a man decided to do pill splitting of his hope to reduce his expenses on medicines.

Pill splitting is not a joke. There are medicines that cannot be split. The effectiveness of the treatment relies on the correct dosage. Once this tablet is split especially those medical condition that needed a higher dose to become effective, the intention no longer warranted.

Splitting a pill need a responsible decision of the patient. It should be given a serious thought. The patient will do the splitting only upon the recommendation of his physician. The decision to split should emanate from the doctor especially on other treatment regarding special cases related to infection.

Splitting of pills is allowed only if the value  of splitting does not affect the effectiveness of the treatment. This splitting method is only applicable to those medicines in tablet form.

In consideration of the higher cost of medicine today, the doctor understand patient intention. If the splitting of tablet is safe and can be justified, then making the effort to save money from the treatment is the best options.

If allowed, for easy convenience of splitting the tablet, a splitting device is available in some of the drugstore in your area. Make it a point to know this following information:

-Never split pills in capsule form. It is not a wise idea.

-Split only those tablets with different dosages. Higher dosages of 120 mg be split to 60 mg (as required) if 60 mg is not available. The cost of two 60 mg is much higher compared to one 120 mg. There will be a saving there.

-Don’t split the dosage in tablet form especially in the treatment of infection. The higher the dosage, there effectiveness can be attained. The lower the dosage (split) not recommended by the doctor can only worsen the infection by letting the bacteria and virus to be more resistant to under-treatment.

-Any tablets with enteric coatings should not be split. This coatings slowdown the breakdown of the medication in the body.

-The tablets with time-release action should not be split. Any division can hamper the medicine to do its job.

There are tablets in different shapes and sizes. Splitting maybe easy or much difficult especially those rounded form. There are tablets that has  line of division at the center. This can be easily split even without the use of splitting device because it was already design for the purpose of pill splitting. Using a metal cutter will do.

Take note that the decision of pill splitting is your own and doctor’s decision. It does not have endosrment from manufacturer’s point of view.