Are you aware of the dangers of self-medication? This is a practice followed by many people. However, it carries serious risks.
Share the post “Know the dangers of self-medication”
Are we really up to par? dangers of self medication🇧🇷 This is an increasingly common practice among the population. Sometimes, people feel pain and immediately resort to a medicine they have at home and which they think is the most appropriate at that time. But what are the risks of this type of behavior?
Basically, the practice of self-medication happens when a person decides to treat himself through his personal knowledge, and may even ask family members or friends for advice or resort to popular beliefs.
And although we all know that medications are necessary to improve some symptoms, illnesses and complaints, they will only be fully effective when there is a very clear medical indication for their use.
Self-medication is characterized by the practice of taking medication without proper medical prescription and, of course, without monitoring by a health professional.
The dangers of self-medication: 6 associated risks
The question of the dangers of self-medication has been gaining more and more importance since more and more people are self-medicating. In fact, it is a serious public health problem in our country today.
The risks associated with this practice can be many and different. Let’s see.
1.
Taking inadequate and excessive doses
One of the biggest dangers of self-medication is taking inadequate and excessive doses. This type of behavior can give rise to several undesirable side effects that can result in very atypical clinical conditions (often misinterpreted).
That is, the same medication, used at the same dose when taken during the same period of time by two different people with similar diagnoses, can have different results and be effective for one and little or not at all effective for another.
two.
Interaction with other medications
As we mentioned earlier, the same medicine administered to two people with similar complaints may not be effective in both people. This also happens due to the daily medication that each one takes.
After all, doctors exist to help us with the most diverse health problems and only they know how each medicine interacts with our current medication.
Thus, self-medication may not only not solve your problem, but also create a worse health situation. There are even some medications that under no circumstances can be administered by people who take a certain type of medication daily. So you already know, always inform yourself.
As much as you think medicine X will help you to minimize your symptoms at that particular time, allergic reactions can strike at any point in your life.
This happens because the medicines are composed of the most different active principles. For this reason, there are some combinations of substances and drug interactions that can trigger this type of reaction in the body.
Another danger of self-medication is intoxication – which can be quite serious and must be avoided at all costs.
Each medicine consists of different concentrations of the active principle. Thus, each person needs a different amount according to their characteristics. In addition, each problem is treated in a different way with the same medicine and the same dose is not always used.
Not considering these factors and self-medicating constitutes a risk to your health: intoxication.
5.
Choice of inappropriate treatment
By choosing to self-medicate, you may be choosing the least suitable treatment for your problem at that time. And even though in your head you think you’ve done it several times and that the symptoms are identical to the situation in the past, this time it might be different.
Taking medications that will not solve your problem can result not only in unnecessary expense, but also compromise your health. Note: if you have appendicitis and decide to cover up the mild symptoms with a ben-u-ron, you can cover it up and make your condition worse without even realizing it.
6.
Inadequate duration of treatment
In this case, antibiotics are an excellent example. There are several people who store antibiotics at home, either because they did not take them when the doctor wrote the prescription, or because they accumulate from previous months in which they did not finish their administration.
And when a sore throat appears followed by an inflammation, they immediately start the “treatment” using the antibiotic they had at home for the time they themselves determine.🇧🇷 However, this type of attitude can have very serious consequences associated with it.
Did you know that taking antibiotics when not really necessary reduces their effectiveness over the years? It is important to think about this, since in the future you may need them and they will not be effective.
Beyond this, the inadequate duration of the treatment given by you, can compromise your health in other aspects: from complications in the stomach, dependence, heartburn, gastric reflux, among many others🇧🇷
Therefore, the ideal thing in case of pain is to consult your doctor so that you can have an assertive diagnosis and take the medication correctly and effectively. Otherwise, the risks of self-medication can have very serious consequences in the future and not solve your problem at all.
