WEBVTT

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Two in the morning, February this year.

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Basia is coughing so hard you can hear her through two walls.

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I go to the kitchen, open the cupboard, reach for the cough syrup,

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and by the torch on my phone, I read a date that ran out in November.

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And it's not that I don't stay on top of that cupboard, I do.

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It's just that I only ever stay on top of it the moment I actually need something out of it.

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Hello, I'm Tomasz Szuster. I built the mojApteczka app.

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And what you just heard is my wife Iza's story.

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Honestly, it's the story of most homes I know.

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Because we go through the medicine cabinet in a crisis. Never before one.

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Which is why I want to do an episode about something deeply unfashionable today.

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The walkthrough.

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You sit down in September or October, before the season starts,

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and you simply go through that cabinet, before anyone in the house is ill.

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Sounds like a tidy-up.

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It does. But a tidy-up is, I'll arrange it more neatly.

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A walkthrough is four questions you answer, and you come out of it with a list.

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Right. So, I'm the person with half an hour on a Sunday and no patience whatsoever.

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What do I do?

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Question one.

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What's in this house that's no longer fit to use?

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Meaning, out of date?

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Out of date.

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And that's the only moment in this episode where I'll say anything about expiry dates.

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Because we've done that properly in episode 7, about what the box actually tells you.

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If you missed it, do go back.

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The whole story of the codes on the packaging is in there.

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And here?

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Here, it's only the action.

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You take it out.

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You read it.

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You put it on one of two piles.

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It stays in the house.

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Or it leaves the house.

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And that second pile goes where?

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Because for years I put it in the bin.

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Into a medicines collection bin.

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And one caveat.

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Because this is a common misunderstanding.

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At least where we are, in Poland, not every pharmacy runs a collection.

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The council organises the scheme, so the most reliable list of drop-off points is on your local authority's website.

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There's a whole episode on this, episode 4, so I won't repeat it.

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One sentence.

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Not the bin, not the sink.

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Find out locally where unwanted medicines go, and take them there.

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Fair enough.

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But now, honestly, how am I meant to know what's out of date before I've emptied the whole lot onto the table?

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Because that's exactly the job nobody wants to do.

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And this is where the app comes in, in a very specific role.

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If those medicines are entered, there's a screen called Expiring Medications.

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It has two tabs.

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On one, you've got what still has time left on it.

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Anything already out of date sits on a separate one.

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Separate?

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So I don't have to fish them out of one long list?

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You don't.

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That was a deliberate decision, because they're two different jobs.

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Expiring is something to think about.

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Out of date is something to carry out of the house.

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Mixing them into one list meant people did neither.

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Question two?

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Question two.

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What am I about to run out of?

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That's the one that catches me out every time.

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Because there's a box.

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There are two tablets in the box.

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I see them.

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I think, we've got some.

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And I shut the cupboard.

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Yes.

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And that's probably the most human mistake in the whole home medicine cabinet.

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We've got some, and we've got enough, are not the same thing.

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In the app, you can set a refill threshold on a medicine.

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You're saying, below this amount, I consider it to be running out.

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And then what happens?

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That medicine lands on the shopping list.

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The list lives in the app, and it gathers two things on its own.

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On its own?

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Meaning, I don't have to copy it out?

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You don't.

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It's a view that works itself out from what's in the cabinet.

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If something's out of date and running low at the same time,

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it shows up once as out of date,

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so the list doesn't swell with duplicates.

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And what if I want to add something we haven't got at all?

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Because half my chemist's list is things that aren't in the house.

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That's rather the point of the list.

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Then you add it by hand.

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From the card of a medicine you already have,

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or straight from the medicine's database,

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even if that product isn't in any of your cabinets.

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That makes sense.

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Because a shopping list that can only show you what you've already got

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is a useless list.

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That's precisely how the first version worked.

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And precisely why it was changed.

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By the way,

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everything we're discussing here

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are actual features in the mojApteczka app.

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Not a pitch.

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Just context.

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Right.

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Now I've got a question that's been sitting with me

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since the start of this conversation.

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Because you keep saying

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expiry date, expiry date.

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And I've got a bottle of syrup in the cupboard,

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opened in January,

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and the box says 2027.

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2027.

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Yes.

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So what am I supposed to do with that?

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The date says it's fine,

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and my gut says a syrup opened eight months ago

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is a different matter from a sealed box.

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Your gut is closer to the truth here

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than the expiry date on its own.

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That date applies to the package unopened.

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For some products,

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syrups, drops, ointments,

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there's a separate, shorter period

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once you've opened it.

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You'll find that period in the leaflet,

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and sometimes it's printed on the packaging too.

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Right.

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So where do I enter that in the app?

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Nowhere.

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There's no field for it.

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There isn't?

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There isn't.

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The app remembers the expiry date

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and the batch number from the box.

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The date you opened it,

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it doesn't remember,

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because I simply never built that field.

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I wasn't expecting that answer

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on your own podcast.

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Would you rather I invented a workaround for you?

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Because I could say,

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just put it in the notes.

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Only that's the advice for a man

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who doesn't want to admit

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he hasn't done something.

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All right.

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That does sound honest.

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It's simply a job for a person,

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not for an app.

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On the walkthrough,

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you pick up every opened package

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and ask yourself one question.

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Do I even know when I opened this?

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And if I don't?

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That's an answer in itself.

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You take the package

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and you ask at the chemist's.

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The pharmacist has the leaflet

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and knows how long that product

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is good for once it's open.

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I'm not the person who gets to settle that,

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and neither is the app.

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And that's the same rule

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as always on this podcast.

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The same.

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The app organises

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what you've entered yourself.

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The question about an opened package

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goes to the pharmacist.

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Question three.

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Question three.

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Where is any of it, actually?

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That's a whole saga in our house.

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There's the bathroom cabinet.

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There's a box on a high shelf in the kitchen.

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There's a bag that lives in the car.

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And there's a wash bag for trips away.

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And that's a normal house,

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not a mess.

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Which is why, in the app,

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you can have several cabinets

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and save a location

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on an individual medicine.

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What for,

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if I know where everything is anyway?

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Because YouTube know.

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The question is

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whether anyone else does.

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Fair point.

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Every cabinet shows three numbers.

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How many medicines are in it?

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How many are expiring soon?

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And how many are below their threshold?

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Above the list,

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there's a summary of the whole house.

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Something like

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three cabinets,

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87 medicines in total.

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So I can see which cupboard

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something's going on in.

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You can see which one,

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without opening each in turn.

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And it reads that

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from the phone's own memory.

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So it works with no signal, too.

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That does matter in our house,

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mind you.

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My mum's bathroom

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has never had a bar of signal.

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And that's not a joke.

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That's a real scenario.

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A cellar,

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a chemist's by the sea,

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a block of flats

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with thick walls.

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Question four.

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Question four.

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And to my mind,

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the most important one.

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Who knows all this,

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besides you?

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That's an uncomfortable question.

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It is uncomfortable.

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Because in most homes I know,

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there's one person

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holding all of it in their head.

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And as long as that person is around,

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everything works.

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And when they're not?

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Then the phone calls start.

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Listen,

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where's that syrup for Basia?

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And someone replies 40 minutes later,

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because they're at work.

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I know that from the other side.

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When my mum stays over

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with Leon and Basia,

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she hasn't got the faintest idea

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what's kept where.

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Which is why a cabinet can be shared

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and a medicine assigned

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to a particular person in the family.

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Not to keep tabs on anyone,

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so that the knowledge

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doesn't live in one head.

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And that shopping list you mentioned,

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can I send it to someone?

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You can,

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and it's probably my favourite detail.

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You've got three filters,

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out of date,

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running low,

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and added by hand.

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Every row has a tick box.

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Only what you've ticked,

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and what you can actually see on screen,

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goes out.

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Why does that matter?

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Because after an autumn walkthrough,

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that list can run to dozens of items.

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And most of them

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are things to carry out of the house,

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not things to buy.

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Meanwhile,

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you're sending your husband

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five things to pick up

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on the way home from work.

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You don't want him

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getting the whole list.

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I don't,

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because he'll get the whole list

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and buy nothing.

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What comes out

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is a message headed

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shopping list,

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mojApteczka,

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with whatever you ticked.

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And that's the whole result

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of the walkthrough.

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Right.

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Let me sum it up

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in plain terms,

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because it's four questions,

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and I'd rather have them

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in one place.

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What's no longer fit to use?

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What am I about to run out of?

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Where is it kept?

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Who knows about it besides me?

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Four.

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And not one of them

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is a medical question.

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It's stocktaking,

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not treatment.

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And that's pretty much

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probably why I'll actually do it.

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Because if you'd said to me,

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sit down and decide

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what's right for the children,

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I wouldn't have sat down.

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Quite right.

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Because that's not your call,

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and it isn't mine.

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The walkthrough is meant to mean

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that in February,

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at two in the morning,

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you're not starting from scratch.

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You know what's in the house

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and where it is.

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Whether you can use it in February,

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that stays a question for the pharmacist.

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The walkthrough doesn't settle it for you.

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So it isn't a case of doing it once

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and being sorted until spring?

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It isn't.

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In the meantime,

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you'll open something,

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use something up,

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bring something new in.

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The walkthrough only sets

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your starting point,

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so those changes

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have somewhere to be recorded.

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It isn't heroics.

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It's half an hour on a Sunday.

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September, October,

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before it all kicks off.

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If you'd like to give it a go,

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do have a look.

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The app is free

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and works offline.

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You'll find the link

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in the episode description.

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And if you enjoyed this episode,

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share it with whoever in your house

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keeps the whole medicine cabinet

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in their head.

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One more thing before we go.

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This podcast is made

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with the help of artificial intelligence.

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I wrote the dialogue myself,

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but the voices you're hearing

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aren't ours.

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They're AI-generated,

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synthetic voices.

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We're telling you this

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straight out

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because we think

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it should be the standard

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for any podcast

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made this way.

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Full details are in the show notes

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and in every episode description.

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Until next time.

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Until next time.