Over-The-Counter Medicines: Are They Really Safe?

Of late, I am observing a common trait among many patients. That is, avoiding consulting a doctor for their ailments. The reasons can be many:

• To save consultation fees.
• Fear of being overmedicated.
• Fear of being diagnosed with a chronic condition like diabetes or hypertension.
• Preference to use search engines over a personal consultation.

As an escape route from consulting a doctor, the patient is seen to directly approach the pharmacist for specific medicines and not take a thorough treatment from a qualified healthcare professional. Bypassing the system is a common demeanor in the society and the same is followed in the medical world too.

A lack of awareness about the sickness and their causes, lack of facilities, lack of time, and financial issues are the major role players in it. I am trying to bring to your attention that ultimately, the harm is to the patient's health.

Because of buying medicines over-the-counter without a doctor's prescription, the symptoms get temporarily suppressed, but the patient ends up suffering for longer periods than necessary and finally land up in a hospital, with more complications, resistance to the previously effective drugs, and an increasing number of incidences of severe side effects of medicines.

Ultimately, the health of the society is getting affected and we are gradually becoming vulnerable to rare diseases, which is evident by the sudden increase in the number of patients with fatal diseases, which is a global concern.

So, my earnest request to all of you is not to overlook the symptoms or try to escape the proper path of treatment. Instead, approach a "qualified" doctor at the very beginning, get proper investigations if needed, and receive the best possible treatment to put a check to the disease in the very initial phase; thereby saving your health as well as money in the long run.

Over-the-counter medication is the major factor in the deteriorating general health and it should be strictly prohibited. We need not wait until the government passes a law prohibiting the sale of potent medicines without proper prescriptions. We must, by ourselves, start avoiding doing so for our own health. If we are competent enough to understand and circumvent it, then it will slowly and gradually get wiped out naturally.