Homemade medicine

[AlwaysPrepping]

Hi all,

I have a question which I hope someone could answer. My question is if in a SHTF situation could you grind painkillers or open antibiotic capsules and put them in a sugar syrup so that a child would take it easier.
I hope this makes sense and that someone has a view on this.
Thanks.

[MissAnpassad]

It depends on the substance and what kind of coating it is on the pill, as some substances react in the acidic environment of the stomach.

[Mad Scientist]

You're right Miss. Another thing is that a child's liver is less developed than an adult's as well as being smaller. Grinding up medicine makes it easy to make a mistake measuring the dosage suitable for their age thus accidentally overdose leading to possible liver failure. Another thing is that a powdered medicine will react all at once rather than steadily over a period of several hours. That is why some medicines are in tablet form and others, like cold/flu remedy are powder. The powders are a lower dose of paracetomol/ ibuprofen or whatever but it is processed very quickly so you get relief of symptoms without overstressing your liver.

[Jamesey1981]

Agree with what has been said by others, one thing I would add is that you don't want to grind up any of the NSAIDs (such as ibuprofen) as they're really hard on your stomach, most of the stronger ones have a gastro resistant coating so that they don't break up until they're past your stomach.

They're that bad that I'm not allowed to take them at all as I suffer from severe gastric reflux and have a family history of (in the case of my mum, lethal) stomach ulcers.