Knowledge, attitude, behaviour of the future healthcare professionals towards the self-medication practice with antibiotics

Abstract

Introduction: Self-medication with antibiotics (SMA) is a major health problem in the developing world including the kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). This practice remains an emerging challenge for the healthcare providers. A few previous studies have estimated the prevalence of SMA among the general population of KSA, but there had been no such studies on healthcare students.
 We aimed to estimate the prevalence of SMA among medical, non-medical students and to evaluate its determinants.
 Methodology: A survey-based cross-sectional study using validated questionnaire was conducted amongst students at King Faisal University in KSA. Chi-square test and logistic regression analysis were applied to identify the determinants of SMA.
 Results: The prevalence of SMA was 58.4% with significantly lower proportion among medical students. Tonsillitis was the most common symptom for which SMA was used and was reported by a significantly higher proportion of medical (54.1%) students. Despite, the awareness of medical students about SMA is unsafe and mal-practice (79.9%), the prevalence of SMA practice remains high. Logistic regression analysis showed that students who incorrectly, identified the effectiveness of antibiotics in treating bacterial infections, the reasons of the antibiotics discontinuation had a higher likelihood to SMA. (OR = 2.16, 95% CI: 1.52-4.503, P = 0.001), (OR = 1.575, 95% CI: 0.923-2.686, P = 0.09), respectively.
 Conclusions: SMA remains noticeably high among the medical students. To overcome this problem, we highly recommend improving the health education to better address this malpractice and improve the students’ knowledge, attitudes and awareness towards the antibiotics use and prescription pattern.

Knowledge, attitude and practice of self-medication in general population of central India

“…In our study, we found that 45.5% of respondents used self-medication for a variety of causes, but in a study by Banerjee I et al, 9 57.05% of respondents used self-medication. In our study, it was discovered that 47% of males and 54% of females selfmedicated, compared to 46.13% of females and 32.5% of males in a study by Kumar N et al 7 A study by Benameur T et al 10 found that 222 (94.5%) respondents were graduates, of whom 125 (56.8%) practiced self-medication. In the current study, the majority of respondents 115 (57.5%) were graduates.…”

Data on self-medication among healthcare students at Najran University, KSA

“…This was similar to the study of who reported negative attitude and inappropriate practice among health science students. [ 19 ] Most of the participants 52.5% in this survey didn't practiced SM. This result can be compared with the other findings where same or higher use of self-medication was reported.…”

Survey of the Knowledge, Attitudes and Practice towards Antibiotic Use among Prospective Antibiotic Prescribers in Serbia

“…This is comparable with the results of some previous studies. For example, a recent study performed in Saudi Arabia among future prescribers showed that sore throat was the most common reported symptom, followed by fever and cough [ 47 ]. In addition, studies conducted in Nepal, India, Sri Lanka and China all showed that the common cold was the most common medical condition for which medical students self-medicated with antibiotics [ 18 , 48 , 49 ].…”