No health facility wants to see resources go to waste. Yet, every year, California facilities spend valuable time and money destroying $100 million worth of unused prescription medicine.
As truckloads of unused medication head for incineration, one in four working-age Americans is skipping the prescription medication he or she needs to be healthy simply because it’s too expensive. Now, for the first time, health facilities can donate medication rather than destroy it. SIRUM’s simple technology platform quickly and easily redistributes donors’ surplus medication to the clinics serving those who need it most.
SIRUM saves lives by saving unused medicine and delivering it to where it can do the greatest good. Since its founding at Stanford University in 2009, SIRUM has helped redistribute more than $1.5 million worth of prescription medicine to Californians in need.
SIRUM reduces pharmaceutical waste, helps health facilities save money, and enables low-income patients to get access to the medicines they need.
Palo Alto, CA
Wendy Yallowitz, program officer
SIRUM identified a barrier and turned it into a simple, sustainable solution. They’ve found a way to capture otherwise wasted drugs and redistribute them to those patients who need them most,” says Wendy Yallowitz, program officer for RWJF's Pioneer Portfolio.
.@SIRUM has helped redistribute more than $1.5 million worth of RxDrugs to Californians in need.
The California HealthCare Foundation produced this video featuring Deane Kirchner, director of nursing at Lincoln Glen Skilled Nursing. In it, she recalls how, with a simple visit to the SIRUM online donation platform, her days of painfully watching drugs go to waste became a thing of the past. The video ends with Kirchner calling for a more widespread embrace of the SIRUM model, which would exponentially increase its ability to reduce waste, prevent environmental harm, and save lives.
SIRUM—as so many of our other RWJF Pioneer grantees have done—identified a barrier and turned it into a simple, sustainable solution.
