ABSTRACT

Antibiotic abuse refers to the use of antibiotics in ways that are hazardous to human health.

Since widespread public usage and abuse of antibiotics has caused the emergence of antibiotic resistance, which accounts for 700,000 to several million annual fatalities, it must be combated using all available tools.

The objective of this study is to determine the prevalence of antibiotic misuse among paediatric caregivers in Benin City, Edo State.

A descriptive cross-sectional research of 263 parents and guardians of pediatric patients who visited the UBTH and Central Hospital facilities in Benin City, Edo State, was conducted. According to the Independent Ethics Commission (IEC) standard, informed consent was obtained from the facilities and the participants using a standardized questionnaire, and the questionnaire was distributed systematically among the study population. The data was cleaned and analyzed using Microsoft excel and IBM SPSS version 25. Descriptive statistics was used to determine the knowledge of proper antibiotic use and prevalence of antibiotic misuse among the participants.

The overall prevalence of antibiotic misuse across both facilities was 217 (82.5%) which indicates a significantly high level of antibiotic misuse among this study population.143 (52.47%) individuals indicated good knowledge of antibiotic use and resistance. The most commonly misused antibiotics was amoxicillin 60 (22.8%), followed by metronidazole 57 (21.9%) generally for symptoms of fever 68 (26.1%), cough 56 (21.4%), catarrh 49 (18.7%) and diarrhea 47 (17.8%). Most of the respondents reported getting their antibiotics from Hospitals with a Doctor prescription (180; 38.4%); and Community pharmacies (90; 34.3%).

This study indicates a significantly high level of antibiotic misuse and an average knowledge of proper antibiotic use among paediatric care givers in this population.