Abstract
Objectives: The aim of the study is to assess the knowledge and self-medication behavior among health professions students regarding antibiotic usage.
 Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed using a self-administrated questionnaire. A sample of 424 questionnaires was distributed randomly among health science students of a medical university in Ajman, UAE. The questionnaire is categorized into three sections which are Socio-demographic details of the participant, knowledge and self-medication practice of antibiotic. The data was entered in MS Excel spread sheet and analyzed as per the study objectives.
 Key Findings: Upon assessing the knowledge of respondents, authors found 85.8% of the students were familiar with the term ‘antibiotic resistance’. Half of the students agreed that antibiotics treat common cold quickly. Regarding the self-medication practices, 55.6% (n= 236) of students reported that they always take antibiotic without prescription. Cold and flu was the common reason for using antibiotics. Augmentin (amoxicillin and clavulanic acid) was the common medication used among the students. Nearly one third of the respondents (32.78%; n=139) saved the antibiotics in case of reinfection.
 Conclusions: In conclusion, antibiotic usage was common among study respondents. Preventive strategies, antibiotic stewardship programs, training, education programs and more restriction towards antibiotic dispensing should be implemented to avoid the misuse and antibiotic resistance.
Highlights
Infectious diseases are a common cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide [1]
Upon assessing the knowledge of the respondents, it was found that most of the students were familiar with the term antibiotic resistance 85.8% (n= 364)
The majority of respon-dents knew that physician prescription can influence the occurrence of antibiotic resistance (68.86%, n= 292)
Summary
Infectious diseases are a common cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide [1]. Advices from friends or family members, advertisements, expensive healthcare systems and lack of time has led people to self-medicate themselves. Self-Medication with antimicrobials is a common problem recognized worldwide and is known to cause side effects, increase antimicrobial resistance, and leads to wastage of economic resources [2,3,4]. The World Health organization has proposed interventions and strategies to minimize irrational use and self-medication of antimicrobials [5]. A warning regarding dispensing of antibiotics without prescription is issued from the Ministry of Health and prevention and they intensified supervision and inspections for most of the pharmacies available all over the country. They raised an advisory to the doctors for rationalizing the prescription of antibiotics to the patients [8]
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