Background: The students, especially medical and dental undergraduates are more involved in the self-medication practice as they are empowered with good knowledge of drugs and diseases and have greater access to medicine. Recent studies have shown a greater prevalence of self-medication among medical and dental students. Objective: The objective of this study is to study the prevalence and risk factors of self-medication practices among medical and dental undergraduate students. Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out among 502, medical (252) and dental (250) students. A predesigned, pretested, and semistructured study questionnaire was used for the data collection of the present study. The students were contacted and they were given the self-administered questionnaire. The questionnaire was collected back once they finished it. The questionnaire did not include any identifying information of the students. All batch students were contacted. Results: Majority (35.9%) were aged 20 years. About 58.2% were females. There were 50.2% of medical and 49.8% of dental students. Almost no one agreed to have any kind of addiction; 53.8% were doing physical activity of <1 h. The prevalence of self-medication among students was 73.7%. It was 74.8% among dental students compared to 72.6% among medical students. The most common drug used for self-medication was paracetamol (30.3%). Most commonly, the drugs were used only for 1 day (33.5%). The most common condition for which the self-medication drug was used was cold (19.9%). No variable studied in the present study was found to be associated with self-medication. Conclusion: The prevalence of self-medication among medical and dental students was very high. However, the drugs used were not harmful and the frequency of use was limited. The practice of self-medication was similar in the two groups and it was not associated with any factors.

No abstract

No abstract

Background: Many studies have investigated the prevalence of self medication practices. World health organization promotes the practice of self medication for relief of symptoms without medical consultation to reduce the burden on health care services. Majority of the individuals in developing country like India have poor knowledge about appropriate use of self mediction, but still they practice taking it without knowing the benefits and risk factors. Methods: The present study was a cross sectional study aimed to gather information about prevalence of self medication in common illness among non health care professionals in a tertiary care hospital. The sample size comprised of 215 participants. Data was collected through an open ended semi structured questionnaire. All the descriptive data was coded, entered in micro soft excel and analysed with frequencies and proportions. Results: The prevelance of self medication was found to be 96%. Near about 30% of participants got information from pharmacist regarding self medication. 27% participants followed allopathy medicine.16% participants used becosules and mucaine gel for mouth and throat ulcers.26% participants used D-cold total for cough and cold.15% participants used dolo 650mg for fever and headache.41.7% participants used ciprofloxacin for ear and eye infections.26.6% participants used gelusil for GI infection .25.7% participants used calamine lotion for skin infections and 48% participants used turmeric for other minor ailments as self medication medicines. Conclusions: As the prevalence of self medication is high among educated participants. The present study suggest the growing trend of self medication has to be prevented by applying strong policies and prohibiting the supply of medicines without a valid prescription.