Understanding burden of medicine disposal: A systematic review

Background: Medicine is one of the most important thing to prevent or treat diseases, yet many people in the world ever incompleting the medication whereas lead medicine disposal. This study aims to explore the pattern of medicine disposal worldwide, in terms type of medicine disposed, the reason and the cost. Methods: A systematic review was performed on PubMed, Science Direct and Google Scholar during the period 2008-2018. A combination key terms such as �medicine disposed�, �medicine disposal�, �unused medication disposal�, �medication wastage�, �reason�, �medicine disposed reason�, �cost� and �medical disposal and cost� were used for the search. Original articles published in English and reported about the reason and/or cost of medicine disposal in a population were the inclusion criteria. Results: Out of 65 articles, 14 articles selected to this study. Analgesics and antibiotic were the major medicine disposed. The most reason for medicine disposal practice was the patients felt better and felt no need to take the medicine anymore. The medicine cost per item is US2, per patient about US940.60, per month reach US 1962.32 and by national projection up to US2.4 billion-US5.4 billion. Conclusion: The practice of medicine disposal is a significant issues to the health and environment field. The role of healthcare professional� is needed to emphasize this incident and futhermore can reduce the costs needed to dispose medicine correctly. © 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.