Adolescents’ knowledge and perception of medicine risk

Abstract

The level of knowledge and the perception of medicine risk are associated with the health status, age and gender of adolescents, and health-care professionals need to be aware of this when educating adolescents.

What Do Young Adults Think about the Safety of Over-the-Counter Analgesics? Findings from a Cross-Sectional Survey

“…Our young adults' knowledge of analgesic safety could be attributed to Australian high school education which teaches adolescents how to access and research health information to inform their decisions from as young as 12 years old, although this is predominantly about harm-minimisation strategies for illicit drugs and alcohol consumption [48]. A smaller proportion of participants in our study believed analgesics to be completely safe and without harm, similar to young adults in Slovakia [17] and Poland [49]. Greater ambivalence over safety was noted in school-leavers, which may reflect more limited experience with analgesics, less autonomy or greater parental influence.…”

“…Questions were informed by the literature or adapted from previously published surveys. In the final survey, one question was adapted from each of four studies including Kelly et al [18], Shone et al [10], Holmström et al [5], and Klimaszova et al [17]. Although some of these were validated surveys, these instruments did not meet all aims of this particular study, and thus selected questions were adapted to address the specified objectives.…”

“…Inappropriate use of OTC medications and subsequent risk of harm could increase if health-related decisions are uninformed [9], young adults engage in risk-taking behaviours [16], or if they perceive less risk for OTC medications than older adults [6]. Young adults reportedly believe that they are immune to adverse effects because they are young and healthy [5], and studies have identified that this population can struggle to identify active ingredients and incorrectly interpret dosing instructions [9][10][11]17]. For example, American adolescents were unaware of what paracetamol was, despite having taken it recently [11], and Swedish youth believed that paracetamol was additionally used for sedating, anxiolytic and performanceenhancing properties [5].…”

“…Young adults appeared less likely to use OTC medication if their parents had advised them of the associated risks [9], and more likely to use OTC analgesics appropriately if their parents were health professionals [20]. Selected studies report that attitudes towards, and preferred sources of information about, OTC analgesics are primarily influenced by family [5,[23][24][25], yet other studies found pharmacists [5,20,26,27], doctors [18,28], or the internet [17], as preferred source of information. Young adults infrequently consult peers about medication [18,20,23,25,26], except for females seeking dysmenorrhea-related advice [5].…”

“…Internationally, the medication-taking behaviour of young adults has been influenced by various factors, including familial attitudes, sources of information, medication knowledge, health literacy, peer influence, and perceptions of safety [10,17,20,24,28,29]. However, to our knowledge no studies have explored OTC analgesic use by Australian youth or identified factors that influence this.…”