The Faculty of Pharmacy discussed the High Diploma thesis, tagged “knowledge, attitudes, and practices of ophthalmic self-medication among students of different pharmacy colleges. “by Sazan Fouad Jameel and the supervisor, Lecturer Dr.Ali Lateef Jasim in the Department of Clinical pharmacy. This thesis aimed to evaluate the levels of knowledge, attitudes, and practices of ophthalmic self-medication among students of different pharmacy colleges. The thesis questionnaire had three parts. Part one was designed to specify the suitable students for recruitment to the study and to obtain their sociodemographic data. Part two involved questions aimed at assessing the practice of ophthalmic SM. Part three was designed to evaluate the knowledge and attitudes of the participating students toward ophthalmic SM. The study involved 604 pharmacy students, with approximately (83.2%) of the participating pharmacy students admitting ophthalmic self-medication. The male participants were significantly higher (62.4%) compared to females. The most commonly self-prescribed ophthalmic medications were antibiotic (28.17%), followed by steroids (22.75%) and lubricants (14.42%). Many participants reported that the reason for ophthalmic SM was long distance from eye care services (15.64%) or that they considered themselves qualified for ophthalmic self-medication (14.81%). Approximately 33% of ophthalmic steroid drop steroid users showed low levels of knowledge of about possible complications of using steroid drops The results showed a large proportion of pharmacy students practice ophthalmic SM without consulting a doctor or reading the medication pamphlets. This can be potentially detrimental to the eyes, especially if they are unaware of the side effects. And we also found that the highest number of pharmacy students practices ophthalmic SM for treatment of eye conditions with low levels of knowledge about possible complications of using steroid drops, and this leads to the appearance of harmful side effects.
