During your stay in hospital your ward pharmacist will:

• talk to you about your medicines
• regularly review your medicines and work with your doctors and nurses to ensure that all medicines are right for you and that they work together
• give you any medicines that you may need during your stay
• give you information on any new medicines prescribed.

We will keep any medicine that you bring with you in a locked bedside drawer while you are in hospital.

Allergies

It is vital that you inform your doctor or nursing staff if you have any allergies. This includes if you have had any previous reactions to medications, food or latex, and the severity of the reaction.

Talking to your pharmacist

Please ask your pharmacist any questions about your medicines, such as:

• What is the medicine for?
• How do I take it and for how long?
• Is it OK with food or other medicines?
• What are the possible side effects?

Please ask staff to get rid of any unwanted or out of date medicines.

When you leave

When you are ready to leave hospital, your pharmacist will:

• give you a list of medicines to take, tell you how to take them, what they are for, and what ones have been stopped
• ensure that you have sufficient medicines to last until you next see your doctor
• check your existing medicines and label them with correct directions
• check if any of your medicines are no longer needed and explain which ones have been stopped.

Paying for medicine

When the hospital pharmacy supplies you with medicines, you will be charged in the same way that you pay for prescriptions at your community pharmacy.

An invoice will be included with your new supplies or sent to your home address. Please advise staff if you have a concession card or if your home address has changed.

If you have a Medicare card, some of your medicine may be subsidised the Australian Government’s Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. This means you will only have to pay for part of the cost of the medicine.