You think that over the counter meds mean no trouble, no side effects.  Think again if you are elderly. This summer I got a head cold.  It’s been years since I had one.  I reached into the cabinet where I keep my vitamins and meds and found the head cold med I like. It was so old that the expiration date printed on the bottle had long passed.  So I got a new one and took it. It was good for clearing the sinuses of mucus, coughing, sinus headache, sore throat and more.  What was wrong?  My vision got blurry. I have wet macular degeneration, which some old people get. My eye chart from my eye doctor has a grid on it of many close vertical lines crossed by many horizontal lines. At the bottom it says call your eye doctor if the lines become wavy.  Well, they were wavy.  I called the doc’s office and was told to come right in.  Called a neighbor to drive me in.  She came over and drove me. Once there I had all kinds of eye tests, including pictures of inside of eye by retina. Doctor looked in my eye with instrument.  He dictated to clerk: no blood. He then asked me if I was taking any new meds. I said I had had a head cold and was taking the XXX cold medicine. That’s it he said. That med clears up the moisture in your sinuses, but also your eyes, so if you have wet macular degeneration, it makes things wavy.  Go home and put eye drops in your eye that lubricate or hydrate your eye for one day.  What a relief, I was not bleeding at the retina, I just dried out and could re-lubricate the eye. My neighbor and I walked out of the doctor’s office and Boom! A big lightening bolt and thunder clap, and the rain came down all of a sudden in buckets. We were parked 50 feet away. We were drenched by the time we got to the car.

When I got home, I got a call from a friend who recommended another over the counter cold med.  I got that and took it, and got an awful stomach ache from it. Turns out it was full of lemon.  I have acid reflux. I don’t drink orange juice anymore.  I can eat a small orange or small tomato with no problem, but orange juice or spaghetti sauce causes pain because of acid reflux. I challenge you to find an old person that does not have acid reflux. Maybe we need special over the counter meds for old people, or warnings in large print for the possible side effects for old people.

Angela H. Fichter