Is Your Medication Working for You? Prescription drugs can
enhance your life, but when not used correctly, they may have
the opposite effect. Medications are serious business and should
never be taken lightly. Ask these questions each time you’re
prescribed a medication: Q: How should I take this drug? A large
percentage of people don't take their medications correctly,
according to recent surveys. Some never bother to fill their
prescriptions in the first place. Others stop taking a drug
without first getting their doctors’ OK. Others don’t follow
label instructions. It’s one thing not to take a prescribed pill
for pain or cold-symptom relief when you start to feel better.
It’s another to take an unsafe dose of that medication, or to
fail to take a drug that could help prevent a heart attack,
stroke, or diabetes-related blindness or amputation. If you know
you can’t afford the drug your doctor has prescribed, speak up
about it. A more affordable drug may exist. Or, if you doubt the
medicine can really do tha