Written by Marietta Hagan, Faith Willis, and Alexyss Skinner
Drug Free Ozarks project coordinator, Marietta Hagan, worked on a pharmacy education project with two local students, Faith Willis and Alexyss Skinner, during the fall semester of 2022. The project was part of the students’ GOCAPS (Greater Ozarks Center for Professional Studies) curriculum. The group met over the course of the semester to work on designing project materials and to plan execution of the project.
The goal of the project was for the students to visit pharmacies in Stone and Taney counties to promote proper medication disposal. The students visited 13 pharmacies during three class periods. The students created a flyer (left) with information as to why proper medication disposal is important to the community. Faith and Alexyss visited pharmacies across the two counties and distributed the flyers and educational materials. As a result of the students’ efforts, 35 flyers and 650 cards were distributed and local pharmacy staff were educated on the importance of proper medication disposal. The students met with pharmacists and pharmacy managers to explain the project and to ask if the pharmacy would be willing to post the flyers and hand out the cards to customers. The information shared on the flyer and cards included the locations of permanent medication disposal boxes as well as a QR code that sends people to the Drug Free Ozarks website that offers more information about proper medication use, storage, and disposal. The intended outcome of the project is that more medications are properly disposed of to reduce access and prevent medication misuse, especially among youth. The project focused on increasing awareness of the permanent medication disposal boxes that are available in the two counties and on urging community members to utilize the permanent boxes or medication destruction packets instead of waiting for the next DEA drug take back event, which only occurs every six months.
