Source:istock
Good day everyone! Its has been a difficult time for me all this time I am at the village.Truely, my days has been hectic all through. But still, the living will always be appreciable for the gift of life given to him by God. Let's move to the point while we proceed. Once again good day hivians.
INTRODUCTION
Sometime ago, I talked about drug routes and the effects of drugs but today,I will simply channel it to rational and irrational drug use. And this explains ways by which patients and victims of circumstances takes medications either appropriately or inappropriately. Hence, we define rational drug use as various means patients receives medications appropriate to their clinical needs; in dose that meet their own individual requirements,for an adequate period of time and the lowest cost to them and their community.
Source:istock
overuse,polypharmacy and incorrect use of drugs are the most common problems of drug use today. The irrational use of drugs may results due to various reasons at various levels including the prescribing errors and over-the-counter drugs. Rational use of medicines may lead to serious negative health issues as we as leading to some economic consequences. Many irrational drug combinations are available in Indian market. proper implementation of rational use of drugs will improve the quality of life and results in better community health care.
PROBLEM OF IRRATIONAL USE OF MEDICINES
WHO on irrational use of drugs defines it as the use of medicines in a way that is not compliant with rational use as defined previously. it was reported that worldwide,more than 50% of all medicines are prescribed, dispensed or sold inappropriately, while 50% of patients fail to take them correctly. Meanwhile,about one-third of the world's population lacks access to essential medicines.
source:istock
SOME COMMON EXAMPLES OF IRRATIONAL MEDICINE USE ARE AS FOLLOWS;
-Overuse of drugs and injections: it occurs as a consequences of overprescribing as well as overconsumption. it is mainly concerned particularly on the use and prescription of antibiotics, painkillers,antidiarrheals injections and cough and cold and catarrh preparations. Injections have long had a special consideration as particularly powerful and fast acting medicines.
Source:istock
-Multi drug use: the number of drugs per prescription is often more than needed by an average of 2.4 up to 10 drugs,while generally one or two drugs would have sufficed. multi drug use is also common among consumers who purchase their drugs over-the-counter drugs.
Source:istock
-Incorrect drug use: this involves the use of drugs for a specific condition or purpose. For example; antibiotics are anti-diarrheal for childhood diarrhoea. and also use of drugs in the wrong dosage which is often the case with antibiotics or antimalarials. Naturally, incorrect drug use occurs in the sense of incorrect prescribing as well as inappropriately use by the consumer or the Patience.
SOME UNDERLINED REASONS FOR IRRATIONAL USE OF DRUGS
Reasons by which people use drugs irrationally are generic in terms. Hence, there are several reasons which contributes to a rational use of drugs in many countries. Therefore,we will be looking forward to explaining the reasons that contributes to the irrational use of drugs in our country.
Before are some but are not limited to the following...
-Lack of basic information: unlike many developed countries, we don't have regular facilities which provides us with up-to-date and well-developed or unbiased information on the currently used drugs. The majority of our practitioners mostly rely on medical representatives. There are differences between a marketer concern and the drug regulatory authorities in the interpretation of the data related to indications and safety of drugs.
-Faulty and inadequate training and education of medical personnels as well as qualified graduates for medicine: lack of proper clinical training regarding writing a prescription during training period, dependency on diagnostic aid rather than clinical diagnosis is increasing every day in medical practitioners.
-Poor communication between health professionals and patients: medical professionals as well as other health professionals give less time to patient and not explaining some basic information about the use of drugs to them.
- lack of diagnostic facilities and uncertainty of diagnosis: a correct diagnosis is an important step towards contributing and controlling irrational drug. Doctors posted in remote and rural areas have to face a lot of difficulty in reaching to a precise diagnosis due to non-availability adequate diagnostic facilities, hence promoting polypharmacy.
-Demand from the patients: in order to satisfy the patient expectations and demand of quick-release, clinicians and medicine prescribers prescribed drugs for every single complaint. Also, there is a belief that every area has a pill and this increases the tendency of polypharmacy.
-Deffective drug supply system and effect ineffective drug regulation: the absence of well organised drug regulatory authority or body as well as presence of large number of drugs in the market leads to irrational use of drugs.
-Promotional activities of pharmaceutical Industries: the lucrative promotional programs of the various pharmaceutical Industries influence the drug prescribing.
IMPACT OF IRRATIONAL USE OF DRUGS
Some of the public health and economic consequences of irrational use of drugs are as follows;
-adverse effects for example due to antibiotic misuse or inappropriate use of drugs in self medication.
-Limited efficacy, example in the case of under-therapeutic doses of antibiotics or tuberculosis drugs.
-Antibiotic resistance: due to widespread overuse of antibiotics as well as use in under-therapeutic dosage.
-Drug dependence; let's take for instance due to daily use of painkillers and tranquilizers.
-Risk of infection occurs due to improper use of injection or injection related disorders are abscesses, polio,hepatitis and AIDS.
- Waste of resources: it reduces availability of other vital drugs and increased cost of drugs.
THE IRRATIONAL DRUG USE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES AS IT FOLLOWS THE ANTIMICROBIAL MISUSE PROBLEM:
According to the WHO(world health organization), antimicrobial resistance is one of the world's most serious public health problems being faced as a major reason of the irrational use of medicines. According to WHO, in the world wide today, more than 50% of all medicines are prescribed dispense or sold inappropriately and 50% of patients failed to take them correctly. The consequences of this is seen directly with the misuse of antibiotics.
PREVENTIVE MEASURES TOWARDS IRRATIONAL USE OF DRUGS
For the well-being of the people as well as the entire society, countries should endeavor to put laws that will control and regulate the conducts of its citizens towards irrational use of drugs. They therefore should;
-Be an active interaction between doctors and patients
-To carefully regulate multiple or over dosage use of drugs,
there should be in a country a developed association of qualified doctors or physicians who sees to the well-being of their patients.
-There should also be a medium of computerized ways of giving prescriptions to patients.
-There should be a satisfied and certified as well as franchised or rather licensed board of association who will punish any multiple drug user.
-Drug manufacturers should be warned and instructed to be putting labels on the body of their drug products to pass additional information to the drug consumers.
In generalizing conclusion, we can see that the issue of irrational use of drugs has been major problem since decades. The Essential medicine concept has been positive since long most of the economical development, and developed or some developing countries have a medicine policy and their essential medicine list is regularly updated. Publication of essential medicine list by government of India in 2003 was a major step towards implementation of rational use of medicines. Now, India has started to adopt policies of generic use, teaching and training the essential medicine Concepts at an undergraduate level, pharmacovigilance programs and precision audits. All this is enhanced towards contributing to the greater goal attainment of rational use of medicine in its proper implementation. it would be very helpful to reduce morbidity and mortality rates associated with the drug use. It also improve their location of the resources leading for better availability of necessary drugs with proper costs. overall, patients will be benefited with decreased risk of unwanted effects such are adverse drug reactions and emergency of drug resistance. Hence,promoting the Rational use of medicines would definitely help mankind and the entire Society to fight the disease and illness for a better tomorrow and a conducive environment for us all. Good day ...
Source:istock
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REFERENCE
-https://googleweblight.com/sp?hl=en-NG&u=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_Action_International
-https://googleweblight.com/sp?hl=en-NG&u=http://www.haiap.org/slmapaper.htm