SELF MEDICATION AMONG TERTIARY EDUCATION STUDENTS

ABSTRACT

Self-medication is the act by which a person, on their own account or as a result of recommendation from a third party, chooses to administer medicine to themselves in order to prevent, treat or cure a condition whose identity and severity is generally unknown. the study was carried out to access the factors, practice and strategies to discourage self-medication among tertiary education students.  The method of the study adopted was the descriptive survey design and a simple random sampling technique was used in selecting the sample population for the study using university of Benin as a case study. The population of the study are 43392 undergraduate of University of Benin. The sample size of 100 respondents was used for the study. Questionnaire was shared among the students. The data analysis was done with the assistance of the responses obtained from the administered questionnaires. The result showed that majority of the sampled population agreed that sometimes practice self medication and paracetamol and antimalarial drugs are the most common self medicated drugs among undergraduates in line with the research questions raised in chapter one. Based on the finding, it was concluded that majority of the respondents practiced self-medication and this was majorly attributes to various factors such as mildness of the ailment, cost effectiveness of the self-medication, severity of health problem, advertisement of drugs, proper knowledge of the drugs, family background, accessibility and availability of drugs, overcrowding of health care center and hospital, distance between home and health care and because it is convenient. And then it was recommended that health education on self-medication should be introduced into the undergraduate curriculum so as to enlighten the students on the risks and benefits of self-medication and national policy and guideline on medicine access should be enforced, with strong disciplinary measures put in place to carry out the policy in order to reduce the use of self-medication in general.