Assessment of Antibiotics Misuse among People in Erbil City

Abstract

Background: Antibiotics are only useful for treating bacterial infections. Inadequate use of antibiotics includes overuse, inappropriate type, dose, duration and/or frequency of administration had been a major problem. Antibiotic use has been identified as a major contributor to the development and spread of antibiotic resistance.

Objectives: Assessment self-medication and inappropriate of antibiotics were used among people in Erbil city. To find out the associations between the antibiotic use and knowledge related antibiotic consumption.

Methodology: The study was used a cross-sectional study, which conducted on 500 randomly, selected adult residents in Erbil by using a face-to-face questionnaire.

Results: About half of the study samples (52.40%) did not know that antibiotics has adverse effect on humans body, 37.80% were agree to used antibiotic for headache treatment, 65.80% of them did not know that antibiotics kill normal flora, and 57.20% were did not know that bacteria become resistant to antibiotics. In addition, 46.00% were used antibiotics on advice of someone other than a physician or pharmacist, 46.20% of peoples were some time used antibiotics against colds and flu, 52.40% of peoples were some time used antibiotics as injection, and 57.20% of peoples were some time used antibiotic as one capsule when needed.

Conclusion: Self-medication and inappropriate use of antibiotics were problems among people in the community.

Recommendation: Strict precautions should be taken about antibiotics use and sale without prescriptions.