Abstract

The use of medications without medical consultation is referred as self-medication. These medications are often called ‘nonprescription’ or ‘over the counter’ (OTC) and are available without a doctor’s prescription through pharmacies or are also available in supermarkets and other outlets. So, self-medication is an increasingly frequent phenomenon worldwide that is considered a public health problem [1]. The indiscriminate consumption of drugs entails disadvantages including decreasing clinical efficacy, an increase in treatment durations and prolongation of recovery. The patient self-medicates not only with OTC medications but also with those medications sold under prescription. This behavior induces the irrational use of medications. In the case of drugs that require a prescription, it is very common for self-medication to be reused after a previous prescription or purchased directly from a pharmacy [2]. This reality is far from being a completely safe practice, because self-medication can produce a series of health risks that in many cases are unknown by population: toxicity (side effects, adverse reactions and in some cases intoxication), lack of effectiveness because they are used in situations where they are not indicated, dependency or addiction, masking of serious clinical processes, delay in diagnosis and interactions with other medications or foods [3].