Self-Medication and Contributing Factors: A Questionnaire Survey Among Iranian Households

Abdarzadeh, N; Ezzatabadi, Mohammad Ranjbar; Rafiei, Sima; Shafiei, Milad; Tafti, Arefeh Dehghani; Saghafi, Fatemeh; Bahrami, Mohammad Amin

doi:10.15562/bmj.v5i3.222

Cited by 6 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 4 publications

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“…The practice of self-treatment has remained a global public health concern (Yadav and Rawal, 2015;Gupta and Singh, 2016;Chang et al, 2017), causing inadequate dosing, incomplete treatment courses, inappropriate usage of medicines and drug resistance (Olumide et al, 2018;Hitesh et al, 2018). The prevalence of self-treatment in Iran has been found to be three times more than global average (Nadia et al, 2016), with the most commonly used medications being analgesics, eye drops, antibiotics, cough and cold preparations, (Saber et al, 2015). Similar studies reported a prevalence of 86.4% in Egypt in 1995 (Agbor and Azobo, 2011;Aashi et al, 2016;Khaled and Haytham, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-medication among inhabitants of Yaounde, Cameroon: Pull and push factors

Jato¹

2023

J. Public Health Epidemiol.

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The rampant practice of self-medication is indicative of very strong existing push and pulls factors. These factors could be economic, social or systemic. Despite having some beneficial effects, selfmedication has life-threatening consequences. This study was aimed to determine the factors which push users to medicine sources or factors at the sources which pull users. A pre-validated questionnaire was administered to participants. Data were collected and analyzed using Microsoft Excel and the results expressed as frequencies and percentages. From the total of 650 respondents, poverty was found to be the major push factor for 360 participants (55.39%), followed by unprofessionalism, friends' advice, previous use of medicine, lack of time, and poor price regulation as others. Low cost of medicines was found to pull 402 (61.8%) users to sources of medicines for self-medication. More than 300 of the respondents found easy access to medicine and advertising as strong pull factors. Other important pull factors include quick and time-saving, proliferation of medicine vendors, hospital crowds, and inadequate prescription checks at sources of medication. Poverty is a major push factor for self-medication, further compounded by quick access to illicit sources of medication. Consequently, users get pulled to cheaper sources, which unfortunately sell poor quality medicines, lack the expertise, or do not check prescription. Price control is required to ensure that quality medicines are accessible to users. Imposing physician prescription at all medicine sales points is a crucial step to fight the deleterious consequences of self-medication. Although self-medication has some positive elements, its practice needs to be put under control to avoid grappling with long term health complications.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-medication among inhabitants of Yaounde, Cameroon: Pull and push factors

Jato¹

2023

J. Public Health Epidemiol.

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Self-medication among the elderly in Iran: a content analysis study

et al. 2017

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BackgroundSelf-medication is described as the use of drugs without a physician’s prescription to treat self-recognized illness or symptoms, and an important health issue among the elderly. Despite the wide range of different definitions, recognizing all forms of self-medication among older adults, particularly, in developing countries, help healthcare professionals and providers to reduce harmful effects of self-medication. The purpose of this study is to describe the practice of self-medication and its related factors among elderly people in Iran based on the experiences of people who are involved in this phenomenon.MethodsThis qualitative study was conducted using content analysis. Purposive sampling was used to select the participants and continued until saturation. The participants were the elderly, their care-givers, physicians, and pharmacists. Data was collected using semi-structured interviews, and analysis was done using an inductive approach. The theory of planned behavior was used as a framework to explain the role of the emerged factors in the occurrence of self-medication behavior.ResultsBased on the expressed experiences of the participants, factors related to the practice of self- medication among the elderly in Iran fit in these 5 categories: “patient’s attitudes towards disease, treatment, and physicians”, “living with disease”, “unfriendly environments”, “enabling health system”, and “influential others”.ConclusionsBased on the results of this study, self-medication of the elderly in Iran has commonalities with many countries in regard to over-the-counter medications and complementary and alternative medicine; however, self-medication is also seen with drugs that require a prescription but can easily be obtained from pharmacies. Contributing factors, apart from the elderly themselves, include their families, caregivers, and social circle, the physical environment where they live, and the health system from which they receive services.

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Self-medication practice and associated factors among adult community members of Jigjiga town, Eastern Ethiopia

Amaha¹,

Alemu

Atomsa

2019

PLoS ONE

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Background Self-medication is the use of any drug or medication to treat an illness or ailment without the supervision of a licensed medical doctor/health care providers. Self-medication practice in Eastern Ethiopia is quite common. However, there is little information with regard to magnitude and associated factors. The objective of this study was to assess the magnitude of self-medication practice and associated factors among adult community members of Jigjiga town, Eastern Ethiopia. Methods A community based cross-sectional study was conducted from June 27- July 12, 2017. Multistage sampling method was used and the number of kebeles and Sub-kebeles were selected using simple random sampling technique. Finally, sampled households in the Sub-kebeles were selected using systematic random sampling. Data were collected using face to face interview with 547 adult (≥18 years) participants. It was entered and cleaned using EPI-Data version 3.02 and exported to Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) Version 23 for further analysis. Bi-variable and multivariable logistic regression models were carried out to identify factors associated with the self-medication. Result The magnitude of self-medication was found to be 37.5% (95% CI: (33.6%–41.7%). Educational status of secondary school [(AOR = 0.46; 95% CI: (0.22–0.98)], high income [(AOR = 3.00; 95% CI: (1.77–5.06)], advised by neighbors, friends or relatives to take drug for their complaint [(AOR = 2.59; 95% CI: (1.62–4.14)], used old prescription /past experience to bought drugs [(AOR = 12.19; 95% CI: (6.65–22.35)], follow advertisements of drugs by television [(AOR = 0.21; 95% CI: (0.05–0.85)], and perception about Hospital drugs (clinics, health centers and hospitals) do not work [(AOR = 2.36; 95% CI: (1.39–3.99)] were significantly associated with self-medication. Conclusion High income, advice by neighbors, friends or relatives to take drug for their complaint, old prescription/past experience use to bought drugs, and perception of hospital drugs do not work was positively associated with self-medication. Therefore, health education should be given to the community on the importance of hospital drugs (clinics, health centers and hospitals) to shift their perception.

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Self-Medication and Contributing Factors: A Questionnaire Survey Among Iranian Households

Cited by 6 publications

References 4 publications

Self-medication among inhabitants of Yaounde, Cameroon: Pull and push factors

Self-medication among inhabitants of Yaounde, Cameroon: Pull and push factors

Self-medication among the elderly in Iran: a content analysis study

Self-medication practice and associated factors among adult community members of Jigjiga town, Eastern Ethiopia

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