A campaign to reduce medicine waste launched last week, which is costing the NHS about £39.4m a year.

The Wandsworth Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) is hoping to reduce the amount of unused prescription medicines, with £90m of unused medicines are being kept in individual homes.

Wandsworth CCG are calling upon people to only order what they need and return unwanted medicines for safe disposal.

Patients are also being asked to take their medicines with them when they attend hospital.

It is estimated one of the biggest problems is repeat prescriptions which are ordered and collected but not used.

Nick Beavon, chief pharmacist, said: "Unwanted medicines in the home may mean that patients are not getting the benefit they could from their prescriptions. It also represents a large amount of waste."

"We want patients on repeat prescriptions to think about what they are ordering and only ask for what they need and are running out of.

"Any of the medicines can be dispensed when needed at a later date, as once medicines have been dispensed, they cannot be recycled."

For more information visit medicinewaste.com