Many Americans Share Prescription Meds (HealthDay)
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However, this can be any extremely bad idea, experts say. Prescription drugs, after all, are prescribed for a reason: for the cause that a doctor or pharmacist needs to play a role in their use.
In the case of shared antibiotics, "we've managed to document that this is a real public health risk," said study first cause Richard Goldsworthy, CEO and director of research and development for The Academic Edge company in Bloomington, Ind.
Goldsworthy's company came up with the idea for their survey while studying whether prescription warning labels should urge some users to not share their medication. Would the labels be effective?
"There wasn't a whole lot of data on it," Goldsworthy said. "So we decided if we were going to ask the question, we needed to mind more broadly at the entire copy, find out who's sharing."
In 2006, researchers interviewed 700 people aged 12 to 44 in several broad U.S. cities, including Los Angeles, Phoenix, Philadelphia and Atlanta, among others. In the one-on-one interviews, the researchers asked the subjects about their use of medications.
The findings are published in the June issue of the American Journal of Public Health.
Two-thirds of those surveyed aforesaid they had never borrowed medications from others or shared their own. However, 23 percent uttered they'd shared their medications through others, and 27 percent had borrowed them; 16 percent had done both.
About 22 percent reported shared pain prominence/muscle relaxant medications, and 7 percent said they'd shared mood-altering medications. A quarter said they'd shared allergy medications, and almost 21 percent reported sharing antibiotics.
The latter number is worrisome, because patients shouldn't have any antibiotics left over after a prescribed course of treatment, Goldsworthy said. In addition, he said, overuse of antibiotics is contributing to the ascend of germs that are immune to many drugs.
"Don't share antibiotics," Goldsworthy advised. "You shouldn't be in actual possession of any leftover. You should have finished them all yourself."
In some cases, however, sharing drugs may not be very risky, Goldsworthy said, and is done for "pretty reasonable reasons."
"I happen to share some painkillers, because I have a bad toothache, I'm sneezing, and my mother-in-law has a prescription medicine while we're in continuance a trip," he explained.
In commander-in-chief, he said," people contingent for a variety of reasons. They share because it's convenient, because they want to fix a problem. And they share for thrill-seeking, like when they arrive pain and mood-altering medications."
Should prescript medications come with warning labels effective users to not share them? Goldsworthy isn't sure, especially considering that medications already accept plenty of warning labels. "It would just realize loss in the sea of other ubiquitous messaging that ends up on pharmaceutical packaging," he said.
More information
The FDA has details about using medicine properly.
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