This week’s challenge is to create a first aid and medicine organizer center in your home, to make sure you have the right supplies for your family when they need them.

First Aid and Medicine Organization

Unless you’ve got a lot of medicines and first aid supplies all over your house this week’s challenge will not take too long, but it is in my opinion vitally important.

That is because your family’s health is important, from taking vitamins, taking care of minor scrapes and bruises, treating minor illnesses with over the counter medications, and dealing with prescriptions and pills to manage or cure various health conditions.

These items need to be stored safely so they stay at their freshest, can easily be found, and are available when you need them.

This week we’ll make sure you can feel comfortable in finding these first aid supplies and medications when you need them.

Step 1: Gather All Your Medicines Together And Declutter

The first step in creating a medicine organizer center is to gather all your medicines, first aid supplies, pills and vitamins together in one place in your home, so they’re not scattered all around everywhere.

It is best to keep all of these supplies together in one spot, not only so you can find what you need more easily, but also so you don’t need to have duplicates of everything.

Remember that many medications have an expiration date, so not having duplicates will make it easier for you not to waste these items.

Declutter any medications that have passed their expiration date, and donate any unopened over-the-counter duplicates you may have that you don’t realistically think you can use before they expire.

Step 2: Gather Supplies For Your First Aid Kit For Your Home

Once you’ve gotten all the supplies together that you already own, the next step in the First Aid & Medical Organizer Center Challenge is to make sure you have everything you need for treating minor medical emergencies and for common illnesses in your home, for all of your family members.

The time to realize you need something of this nature is not when you need it, but to be prepared ahead of time.

Step 3: Choose A Spot In Your Home To Keep Medication And First Aid Supplies

The third step in the First Aid and Medicine Organization Challenge is to choose a spot for all these supplies to be kept.

In last week’s challenge, when we organized our bathrooms, I explained why the bathroom was not necessarily the best place to keep your medications. Basically, medication storage is best in a temperature controlled, non-humid environment and the bathroom does not fit those criteria.

I would suggest keeping your medical supplies in a central location of your home though, and many people like to do this in their kitchens. Just be sure, if you keep these items in the kitchen that they are far away from the oven and stove, since the heat from these appliances could harm the medications in a similar way to problems in the bathroom.

I’d love to hear idea in the comments from people sharing where they’ve decided to keep their medical supplies in their home, to give others ideas of what may work for them too.

Be Considerate Of Safety Wherever You Place Your Medicine Organizer Center

When deciding where to place your pills and medicines, be mindful of safety.

Clearly, prescription medicines especially, but also over the counter varieties, can be harmful in large doses or when ingested or used by someone other than the intended recipient.

Be mindful of where you place items so small children and pets cannot accidentally ingest them. Examples of places that might work include up high in a cabinet or using a child safety latch if in a lower cabinet.

In addition, abuse of prescription and other medications is unfortunately on the rise. If this is a concern in your household you may want to go even further and put any medications which could be abused in a locked container.

Other Places Where Small First Aid Kits Can Be Useful

Please note that this week’s challenge is focusing on your main first aid kit that you keep in your home. However, smaller satellite kits may be appropriate in other places around you.

For example, when we organize our purses, or our cars or other vehicles, these are other prime locations to place a small first aid kit. You can wait until those weeks to work on these smaller kits, or go ahead and add them now.

Further, in the previous Create An Emergency Preparedness Kit Challenge we added a first aid kit to our emergency supplies.

Step 4: Consider Storage Solutions For Your Medicines & Pills

The final step in the First Aid & Medicine Organizer Center Challenge is to actually put your medications, pills and first aid supplies into their newly designated spot, so you can find them when you need them.

Below I’ve gathered some medicine storage solutions you may like to use to keep things neat and organized in your center:

Storage Solutions In Your Home

It is nice to keep all of your medications and supplies together on one shelf of a cabinet, for example. Instead of having everything loose it is often easier to keep things contained together in a container, or even a lazy susan to make access easier.

If you’re concerned about safety, and want something that gives you the ability to lock the medicines up here are some possible storage solutions for you.