Police department accepting unused pharmaceutical drugs

For those people that have put cleaning out their medicine cabinets at the bottom of their “to-do” list, the time for procrastinating is over. Instead of waiting for the Conway Police Department to take part in the national drug take-back day, held in April, community members can now bring any unused prescription or over the counter drugs to the police department to be disposed of properly.According to La Tresha Woodruff, public information officer for the department, a drop off location has been installed at the department for the community to use.“The generous people at the post office gave us a blue box, which we have painted white and placed inside the department for people to dispose of their unused prescriptions or over the counter medication,” she said. “Anyone wanting to use the box can come in the lobby and tell someone in the records department that they need to drop some items off and they will be assisted in doing so.”Woodruff said the department receives a lot of calls from members of the community who want to know what to do with used portions of prescriptions or left over medicines, so they are hoping that having the drop off box is a benefit to the community.“Usually, we have a drug drop off day maybe once or twice a year but some people might not have the opportunity to take advantage of it,” she said. “However, now community members can feel free to use the box when they need it.”The CPD encourages people not to discard their unused prescriptions or over the counter drugs by simply throwing them in the trash or flushing them down the toilet because of the affect it can have on the environment.“Drugs that are flushed down the toilet can end up being absorbed in drinking water sources, which is definitely not a good thing,” Woodruff said. “Also, just throwing drugs away in the trash does not keep them out of the hands of children, which is one of the reasons why we encourage people to dispose of unused drugs in the first place. Bringing the unused portions to us is the safest way to dispose of them and we encourage everyone to participate by bringing their items in to our department.”