Before You Leave the Hospital: How We Get Your Medications to You
We bring your prescriptions to your hospital room and go over each one with you before you go home.
October 29, 2026
Leaving the hospital is a lot to manage. You may have new prescriptions. Some of your old ones may have changed. You are supposed to remember all of it while you are still recovering.
Then there is the pharmacy. It may be closed by the time you get home. You may not have a ride. The medication may cost more than you expected.
Before 2023, only about half of our patients said they clearly understood their medications when they left Nashville General Hospital. We built Meds-to-Beds to fix that. A year later, that number was 80 percent.
How Meds-to-Beds works
Your hospital care team reviews your medications and decides what you will need at home. Those prescriptions go to our Community Pharmacy on the first floor.
Before you leave, a pharmacist brings your medications to your room. They sit with you for about 15 minutes and go through each one:
- What it is for
- How and when to take it
- Whether to take it with food
- What side effects to watch for
You get written instructions to take home. Then the pharmacist asks you to explain the plan back in your own words. That is the fastest way to catch anything that is still unclear.
Meds-to-Beds is for any hospital patient, with or without insurance, as long as the medication is in stock and any copay is covered. If you would rather use your regular pharmacy, including Nashville Healthcare Pharmacy at Metro Center, we can send your prescriptions there instead.
What to do before you leave
- Ask about Meds-to-Beds. Ask your nurse or care team if your prescriptions can be brought to your room.
- Go through every medication. Make sure you know what each one is for, and whether it replaces something you were already taking.
- Say so if cost is a problem. Tell your care team before you leave. There may be help you qualify for.
- Know who to call. Before you go, make sure you know who to contact with questions or for a refill.
If you cannot pay for your medications
Some patients have insurance but arrive without a wallet. Some have no insurance at all. Either way, tell us. We have options.
The NGH Hope Meds Program provides certain medications at no cost to uninsured patients whose income is at or below 300 percent of the federal poverty level. You fill out a short form, and pharmacy staff tell you which of your medications are covered.
The NGH Foundation's Patient Medicine Fund helps patients who do not qualify for other programs.
Camille Dao, PharmD, wrote about all of this in What to Do When You Cannot Afford Your Prescription.
More help, same idea
Once we were at the bedside, we found other things patients needed before going home.
If you are newly diagnosed with diabetes, we bring a glucose meter, test strips, and a guide to living with diabetes to your room, so you can practice checking your blood sugar with a pharmacist before you leave. The Community Care Team can keep helping after you are home.
If you are scheduled for a colonoscopy, our pharmacy and GI team can provide a lower-volume prep for patients who qualify, and we go over the instructions with you when you pick it up.
Getting home safely starts before you walk out the door. That is what Meds-to-Beds is for.
Meet Your Pharmacists
Your pharmacist is part of your care team, whether you are leaving the hospital, managing a long-term condition, or filling a routine prescription. The Community Pharmacy is on the first floor of Nashville General Hospital and serves hospital patients and the surrounding community.
