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ASSESSMENT OF KNOWLEDGE AND ATTITUDE OF GENERAL PUBLIC TOWARDS THE USE OF PAINKILLERS IN BAHAWALPUR

Dr. Muhammad Arif, Dr Muhammad Saad Afzal, Dr Muhammad Ahmed

One of the most widely used and abused drugs all over the world are painkillers, pain is an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage or described in terms of such damage. Pain can occur as an acute, chronic, or intermittent sensation, or as a combination of the three, and is reported to be the common reason for medical visit. Specific objectives of the study were to assess the knowledge and attitude of people regarding the use of painkillers and highlight the reason for improper use of painkillers in people of Bahawalpur. This was a cross-sectional questionnaire based survey. The study was conducted between Januarys to March 2018 in Bahawalpur Pakistan using a structured questionnaire. Data was taken from 412 residents of Bahawalpur those who were taking painkillers. Descriptive and inferential statistics were applied by using SPSS version 20. 255 (61.9%) respondents were male and 157 (38.1%) respondents were female. 223 (54.1%) respondents were in 18-30 years of age group that is of maximum strength and 19 (4.6%) respondents were between 61-80 years that is minimum strength. 91 (22.1%) were maximum number of respondents those had above 35000 monthly income and 89 (21.6%) had income below 14000. Majority had knowledge about the use and side effect of painkillers they had positive attitude towards painkiller use. 80% of total respondents answered“yes” for the question if painkillers can relieve the fatigue and pain or not. (65.7%) of total said painkillers can relieve fever. (26.5%) responded with yes that it is appropriate to use painkillers in children less than 12 year. (57.5%) said painkillers can cause sleep disturbance, (47.5%) said shortness of breath, (74.6%) knew that painkillers can cause stomach ulcer. The frequency of pain experienced by most of the respondents 178 (44%) was once a month. (50.3%) used Panadol, respondents those who felt headache were 175 (43.2%). Most of the people used specific painkillers by the prescription of doctor. (74.1%) preferred to take painkillers in tablet/capsule form, (80.7%) took their medicine with water, (64.1%) bought painkiller from medical store. Result of study demonstrates that people of Bahawalpur had satisfactory knowledge about painkillers and had positive attitude towards painkillers majority knew the side effect of painkillers. Key words: knowledge, attitude, side effect.

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