Easy Ways to Remember to Take Your Meds

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woman holds a white pill up to her mouth, about to take it

I've seen a surplus of cool ways to remember to take your meds lately — so I thought I'd round some up. I'm sure a lot of you have memory hacks of your own for remembering to take your meds — please share!

My Memory Hack for Remembering to Take My Meds

One memory tip that I've used sometimes to remember to take my meds is this: I keep the pill bottle on the LEFT hand side of the sink, and after I take it I move it to the RIGHT hand side. I'd heard that you can imprint a physical habit like this by doing it 30+ times — even in a short time period, so when I started with a new medicine, I practiced doing that. This has worked for me for a long time — but when the kids went back to school my morning system got a bit screwier, and I've found myself wondering on numerous days whether or not I took my meds. (Did I take them and just forget to put them on the correct side of the sink? Did I forget to “reset” the pill bottle to the left side the night before, and didn't actually take them?)

I've never liked pill organizers because they take too much time to fill and often don't hold more than a single pill (plus, they're usually not safe around kids).

That said, I've seen a number of newer, easier products addressing just this problem in more streamlined ways, so I ordered a few to check them out…

How to Remember to Take Your Meds: Pill Poppers

a keychain-sized bubble-popper with days of the week that can attach by rubber band to a nasal spray, liquid medicine (both pictured), or pill bottle (not pictured)

These Pill Poppers are one of the first things that arrived — a three pack is under $10. I am giving these as stocking stuffers this year; they're so cool. You can adapt this to any pill bottle (or spray or liquid bottle) because it's got something similar to a silicone rubber band at top. (I have it on a typical brown drug bottle and it hasn't interfered with the safety cap at all.) It's tiny, easy to use, and super satisfying to “pop” the day of the week in. The only trick, of course, is remembering to do the correct day…

(I could see these being difficult if, like my mother, you keep about 10 different medications in a tight space like a plastic basket, just because the pill poppers might get accidentally jostled/popped/unpopped when you add/remove different medications.)

The system also has an AM/PM pop button if you need to take the drug twice a day, but the next system might be more helpful. for that If you don't like the bubble popper, this “take n slide” medication tracker sticker might be better — I didn't buy it because it's a bit more expensive (around $20 for 5) and is stuck on the side of the bottle. They say it's reusable and can be unstuck easily, for what it's worth.

How to Remember to Take AM/PM Meds: The Chart

a white and green chart that reads "DID YOU TAKE YOUR MEDICINE?" with columns with the days of the week and AM/PM; a woman is sliding over a tab for Saturday PM.

I got this visual medication reminder/tracker primarily because my son takes a few meds, and depending on who's watching him and medicating him, I thought this one could be useful for a team. (We've double-dosed a kiddo at least once with antibiotics (years ago now)… that was a fun call to Poison Control.) I also like that the chart clearly has AM/PM in different columns, and (as the sales page points out), if a family member notices that you haven't taken it, they can remind you.

Admittedly, you could also just keep an index card near your meds with similar handwritten columns and just check them off — but where is the fun in that?

How to Remember to Take Your Meds: The Timer Cap

two timer caps that display the "time since last opened" on the top of a brown pill bottle; the caps are blue and red

I think this is the ultimate solution — timer caps that display the last time the pill bottle was opened!! Brilliant!! So long as the battery works well, of course. You can get 2 for around $15.

Readers, what are your favorite tips and tricks to remember to take your meds? Have you tried any medication reminder products like these timer caps and so forth?

Stock photo via Stencil.

12 Comments

  1. I have a daily med case from Nordstrom (the only non-geriatric looking one I could find). It takes like 30 seconds to fill on Monday night and then I throw it in my purse so I always have my meds with me. I am a terribly forgetful person and wish I had started using the organizer way earlier– I’ve saved sooo much mental energy I used to devote to “crap, did I take my meds today?”

  2. If I don’t take them I go into very severe withdrawal. That teaches you to remember pretty quickly. :)

  3. I have a pill organizer sorted by days of the week with an AM half and a PM half and set an alarm on my phone to take the AM ones at 9am and the PM ones around 6 or whenever I eat dinner. Seems foolproof enough for me!

    1. I have that as well. My organizer has individual cases for each day, so it’s easy to pop in my bag if I’m going to be out at med time. And they hold several large pills in each half.

      1. Lol if yours is from Target, we have the same one! It holds a ton…I’ve just started putting supplements in it too

  4. I’m really curious about a pill cap that just shows the last time I took a med. My doc wants me to take my Cytomel twice a day, and apparently I can easily remember to take anything twice a day, but because it also has to be taken away from certain foods and I don’t eat the same foods at the same times every day, it’s been a nightmare of trying to remember whether I’ve taken it or not.

    I also have a “take as needed” med, and being able to see “yes I already took it” would be really helpful, since sometimes I don’t take it because I’m not sure if I took it and it’s not working, or I am imagining that I took it.

    1. For the Cytomel, why not just use a regular pill case and load it with 2 for every day? Then easy to see if you have or haven’t.

      For as needed, there are caps that say how long it’s been since you last opened the bottle.

    2. For your Cytomel, next time you get a refill, save the old bottle and put half the pills in it. One half goes near your toothbrush for the AM pill, the other bottle can go in your bag or next to where you eat dinner at night, wherever you’ll remember to take your PM pill.

      1. That’s a good idea.

        I kept my tablets in the location that helps: early morning and last thing at night meds go on my nightstand, ‘with dinner’ lives in my lift chair table, and ‘after food’ goes next to the kettle as I have herbal tea after a meal. So ugly but so necessary.

        I also make up a little kit of pain medication, migraine meds, antihistamines etc plus a few spare tablets of meds to travel with me everywhere I go.

  5. I have two day-of-the-week pill cases I bought at someplace like Walgreen’s. I bought the smallest one because my pills are small. I bought two because I find it a pain to fill up, and this way I only have to do it every other week, and that keeps me up to date on when I should be checking to make sure my refill is on schedule.

    It sits in my medicine cabinet on the shelf below my toothbrush, so that reminds me to take my pills right after I brush my teeth. Some evenings I see the case and realize I forgot my pills that morning so I take them right after I brush my teeth at night.

    I take synthroid, an antihistamine, spironolactone, and a vitamin D+K supplement every morning, and they all fit fine even though the supplement seems like a larger capsule.

  6. I get the meds I need daily filled at PillPack (now owned by Amazon). They send you a roll of individual packets for each day, an idea apparently imported from Denmark. They’re all dated, so I just tear off the day’s packet. I take what i’d consider a lot of meds and supplements, so it’s been a big timesaver and is just one less thing to think about. I think CVS mail order does something similar now, too.

  7. I take an ADHD medication first thing upon waking every single day and LOVE timer caps…………when they work. Which is not often. They die quickly, sometimes they don’t reset right. If one worked perfectly, it would be great :/. The six months I had one that consistently worked was so nice.
    Because timer caps are so finicky, I’ve tried everything else, but still about once a month, I have to count how many pills I have left, which is pretty stressful. It’s not a medication you can double a dose on at all, or skip a dose. Recently I’ve been marking on a calendar when I start a new month. Since I always get 30 at a time and never skip a dose, I can at least be confident on that number.

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