I take sooo many pills and was wondering how they arent going to get stuck one of these days. I take 16 pills in a day 20 after I break the horse pills up. Some are big that I cant split. At the hospital they acted like it was no big deal and gave me a shotglass worth of water to take them all with. I about gaged. I just know when I get a fill Im going to have trouble. I mean jeez ya cant swallow food that isnt chewed why do they expect me to swallow a bunch of pills unchewed

I learned a trick when I volunteered at the hospital in the emergency room many years ago. Go to bed, bath and beyond and buy a mortal and pestal (forget how it is spelled). Grind your pills up fine. Get a small juice glass and place the ground up pills in it. Fill it with very warm water as warm as you can stand and make it a paste consistency. Then drink it. Chase it with something like tea or more plain water. It isn't the tasty thing to do but it works.

Forgot to say since you take so many you may not want to do that all at once depending on how well you swallow. So take half your pills and grind them and mix the paste and then take the other half and do the same thing if you can't swallow that much of the paste all at once.

I saw a pill crusher at Walmart for about $4, that may work. My doctor told me that we have to crush all pills that won't fit through a straw. He said that if you can't crush them, then a lot of medications have liquid forms available. He did warn not to crush extended release medications, instead to have your doctor to change your prescription. Hopefully as you progress with your weight loss you won't have to take as many pills. :biggrin:

I learned a trick when I volunteered at the hospital in the emergency room many years ago. Go to bed, bath and beyond and buy a mortal and pestal (forget how it is spelled). Grind your pills up fine. Get a small juice glass and place the ground up pills in it. Fill it with very warm Water as warm as you can stand and make it a paste consistency. Then drink it. Chase it with something like tea or more plain water. It isn't the tasty thing to do but it works.

I take 19 pills a day, including some for my kidney and pancreas transplant from many years ago that I must take every single day. Before my LAP-BAND®® 2 years ago I worked with my Dr's to see if the meds I take could be crushed. We did a series of blood tests over a month and they all came up fine.

I started using a grinder that I got at Horten and Converse but after a couple of weeks it would start to clog up and it became harder and harder to use. Then I bought this heavy duty pill crusher online but it took way too long to crush all my pills. I finally got a good mortar and pestle (my mom gave me her old nursing school one from 47 years ago. lol) and have been using it every day and it is fine. I bought some small plastic bags from Walgreens and in the morning I crush my monring and evening meds for the day and I keep my evening meds with me in my pocket.

I've found that putting the crushed meds in sugar free chocolate pudding works the best for me. The good news is that there's lots of types of sugar free puddings now. I use 1/2 a cup each time and I try and slide each mouthful down without letting it linger in my mouth so I don't taste it. In a pinch I can take it with anything - even water - but it is pretty disgusting that way.

When you are in the hospital you need to let your Dr. and nurses know that you cannot swallow and pills and they will crush each for you and give you some apple juice or something.

If you are still not able to get all of your pills crushed then you can look into getting your meds compounded into a liquid at a specialty pharmacy. It's pretty expensive and they may not be able to do this with all of your meds.

I learned a trick when I volunteered at the hospital in the emergency room many years ago. Go to bed, bath and beyond and buy a mortal and pestal (forget how it is spelled). Grind your pills up fine. Get a small juice glass and place the ground up pills in it. Fill it with very warm Water as warm as you can stand and make it a paste consistency. Then drink it. Chase it with something like tea or more plain water. It isn't the tasty thing to do but it works.

The only thing with this is that there are pills that can't be rushed because they are extended release, and also some pills can't be mixed together like that. It's important to check with your doctor and/or a pharmacist to see if it's okay.