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Highlighting the menace of self-medication, a study released on the occasion of World Health Day has claimed that 52 per cent Indians indulge in the practice, often exposing themselves to health hazards.
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The disturbing trend came to the fore through a study, conducted by doctor-to-patient communication platform Lybrate, which covered a total of 20,000 respondents across 10 cities in March.
Speaking on the findings, Director General of Health Services Jagdish Prasad said that the practise was almost a part of everyday life in the country which must be “shunned to avoid health hazards”.
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“In India, everyone claims to be a health expert. From the local chemist to your co-passenger in public transport, every person is ready to offer expert advice or medicines for various diseases which may seem harmless from the surface,” he said.
Prasad also highlighted the risks posed by taking irregular courses of antibiotics that he said triggers “antibiotic resistance”.
“This is what self-medication is contributing to. We can arrest the trend by making available more doctors and making use of the huge pool, nearly 8 lakh, of Ayurvedic doctors whose services are not being utilised properly,” Prasad said.
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Lybrate CEO Saurabh Arora said that the survey was launched as they observed that a large number of patients using their app, which connects patients to around 70,000 doctors registered with the company, were already under some sort of medication.
“But they were unsure of the medication they were under. Then we launched the survey and found that most of them were unsure as they were under self-medication of one sort or the other and were not taking medicines through professional advice,” he said.
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Arora said that the survey was carried out through social media sites, email and through their company website.
“The results were disturbing. Reasons for this growing trend include time constraint, or the want of doing away with doctors fees or the more recent dependency on the internet,” he added.
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