Self‐Medication Patterns Among Medical Students in North India

Self‐medication can be defined as obtaining and consuming drugs without the advice of a physician for diagnosis, prescription or surveillance of treatment. [1-3] Self‐medication differs from self‐care in that it involves drugs that may do good or cause harm. [4] It has been found that inappropriate self‐medication causes wastage of resources, increases resistance of pathogens and generally causes serious health hazards such as adverse drug reactions, prolonged suffering and drug dependence [4-7].

A cross‐sectional study was undertaken. The study population consisted of medical students from first to final year, within the age group of 18-25 years. The information pertaining to the pattern of self‐medication, indications for self‐medication and drugs used for self‐medication were included in the questionnaire. The data was analyzed using SPSS version 20.00.

A total of 100 students participated in the study, of whom 61(61.00%) were male and 31 (39.00%) were female. A total of 88 (88.00%) participants practiced self‐medication(Figure 1-4).

Figure 1:Conditions prompting self‐ medication.

Figure 2:Class of drugs for self-medication.

Figure 3:Common sources of information for self‐ medication.

Figure 4:Sources of information.

Self‐medication is becoming an increasingly important area within healthcare, and this study has shown that it is even more prevalent among medical students. This study has found a prevalence of self‐medication of 88 % in medical students in contrast to 59% in a non‐medical population in a previous study [2]. It is also noted that a high level of education and professional status are predictive factors for self‐medication [4]. This is like the findings in a study conducted by Erlend Hem and colleagues [6] (90%) but is higher than the findings (60%) in the study conducted by Henry James and colleagues [4].

In the study it was noticed that the classes of drugs that were commonly used were antipyretics analgesics, antihistamines and antibiotics. This is like studies done earlier [4,5]. The study has found that self‐medication is very common among medical students, facilitated by the easy availability of drugs, and information from textbooks/seniors. Since inappropriate self‐medication has the potential to cause serious harm, not only to the students themselves but also to those whom they suggest medication, potential problems of self‐ medication should be emphasized to the students to minimize this risk.

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