التداوي الذاتي : هل هو حاجة أم عادة ؟ دراسة ضمن الطلبة الجامعيين في دولة الإمارات

Abstract EN

BACKGROUND: Many people take the role of doctor when it comes to simple and superficial health problems.

Self-medication is a global form of self-care practice and can be defined as "taking of drugs, herbs or home remedies on one’s own initiative, or on the advice of another person, without consulting a doctor".

The utilization of over the counter drugs among university students is common and many studies revealed that there is an increase in trends of self-medications particularly among the youth.

There is much public and professional concern about the irrational use of these drugs.

OBJECTIVE: The present study was undertaken to determine the pattern, prevalence of self medication, as well as to estimate the level of knowledge of towards medication safety.

Materials and Methods: Nine hundred thirty-eight students were enrolled from different nonmedical majors in the UAE in a descriptive study.

Data analysis was performed using SPSS Version 24.

The statistical significance level was determined at (p < 0.05).

Results.

The prevalence of self‑ medication in our study was found to be (94.

2%); the major reason cited by participants to self-medicate was minor illness (77.9%).

CONCLUSIONS: Self medication is widely prevalent among the non-medical students in UAE.

The study findings address the crucial need to develop structured health education programs to raise knowledge, belief and awareness of the students about responsible self-medication.

The health authorities should take strict measures to stop the practice of non-responsible selfmedication.