How do you dispose of medicines and medical devices at home? Share your experience with ENKORE

Take the ENKORE patient questionnaire

Understanding everyday habits and challenges

What do you do with medicines you no longer need, a used medical device or the packaging left after treatment at home? Is it clear where these items should go? Are suitable collection points easy to access?

Through the Patient Questionnaire: Disposing of Medicines & Devices at Home, ENKORE invites people to share their everyday experiences, the challenges they encounter and the support they would find useful.

The questionnaire explores current disposal practices, including the types and frequency of disposal activities. It also examines awareness of disposal guidance and understanding of the potential environmental and health risks associated with improper disposal.

These insights will help identify where better information and practical support may be needed.

What could make disposal easier?

Appropriate disposal can be difficult when instructions are unclear, collection facilities are hard to access or the available options are inconvenient.

The questionnaire seeks to understand these barriers and explore improvements that could help people adopt safer and more sustainable practices. These include clearer labelling, accessible collection points and take-back programmes.

By sharing their views, participants can help ENKORE understand which changes would be useful in their daily lives and what might encourage better disposal practices at home.

Bringing patient perspectives into the research

Patient organisations participating in ENKORE will support dissemination through their communities and networks, alongside other project partners and ENKORE’s communication channels.

Their involvement will help the questionnaire reach people who use medicines and medical devices at home, bringing everyday experiences into the project’s research.

Patient organisations, healthcare professionals and other stakeholders are encouraged to share the invitation through the channels most relevant to their communities, including newsletters, email, websites and social media.

Supporting more sustainable healthcare

ENKORE is a public-private research project supported by the Innovative Health Initiative Joint Undertaking. It aims to develop a circular, safe and sustainable eco-design framework for single-use medical devices and packaging, minimising environmental impact and optimising resource use without compromising patient safety.

The project considers the full product lifecycle, from design and manufacturing to use and end-of-life management. Its work includes developing tools to assess product circularity and support sustainable decisions in hospitals and homes, alongside recommendations for manufacturers, healthcare professionals and policymakers.

Understanding how medicines, medical devices and their packaging are handled after use at home contributes to this wider effort.

Share your experience

If you use medicines or medical devices at home, we invite you to complete the questionnaire and contribute to ENKORE’s research.

Complete the anonymous questionnaire — approximately 15 minutes

Thank you for sharing your experience and supporting safer and more sustainable healthcare practices.