Hello there! It has been a while here (and that is because this site is currently under construction). How have you been? If you will ask me, I have been good! just a bit occupied.

Gradually, this month is running to an end (just like a dream). Well, I hope you still have the fire and the zeal you started the year with. Are you still trying to work around your new year resolutions? I am struggling to keep up to mine (I am being real here).

Anyway, I started a series on the unhealthy habits you need to ditch in order to stay healthy all through this year and beyond. In case you missed the previous posts, kindly use the explore icon and type: Unhealthy habits (it will bring up the previous posts) or follow this link

Today, I am talking about one of the major unhealthy habits you really need to stop this year and that is;


Self-medication is defined as the selection and use of medicines by individuals to treat self-recognized or self-diagnosed conditions or symptoms without confirming the diagnosis. Yes, sometimes it is what you can do in order to treat an emergency before going to a healthcare facility, it can help reduce the costs and save you from the hospital’s long queue. No matter the good/benefits self-medication gives, it can go wrong and pose more danger to your health/life.

Potential risks of self-medication include:

  • Incorrect self-diagnosis( you may not be able to make a proper diagnosis because different medical conditions may pose similar symptoms and might need a comprehensive tests to arrive at the correct diagnosis. Making a wrong diagnosis by yourself means that you’d be using wrong medication and that could lead to tons of complications. For example, a client had a severe headache, he took paracetamol by himself(very common) and slept but he woke up in the hospital with a new diagnosis of hypertensive emergency with stroke in view because his blood pressure was apparently high at the time he thought he only needed paracetamol. We lost him because at the time of presentation, serious complication had developed.
  • Delay in seeking medical advice when needed: Delaying your visit to the hospital because you feel/think the drugs you have taken are enough and can treat your ailment leading to further delay of getting appropriate care by the professionals
  • Infrequent but severe adverse reactions: Different medicines come with different adverse reaction depending on your system and what is ongoing in your body at the moment. If prescribed by a professional, the possible adverse effects would have been discussed and weighed before prescribing the medication .
  •  Dangerous drug interactions: There are medications that shouldn’t be taken together because you may slow down the action of the other or even prevent it from acting completely. You wouldn’t know because you haven’t gone to study about it. Taking some medications together can be disastrous and do not think that those ones are the complex drugs, there are over the counter drugs that you cannot take together .
  •  Incorrect manner of administration, incorrect dosage, incorrect choice of therapy,
  • Masking of a severe disease: Some diseases for example Appendicitis can be masked or cover when you take painkillers to relieve pain at the early onset of the disease leading to the rupturing of the inflamed appendix leading to serious complications… Do not just alleviate pain when you do not know what the cause of the pain is.
  • Risk of dependence and abuse: Often people abuse some painkillers and some sedatives even to the point that they can not perform/function well without taking the medications. That is what self-medication can do!

Let me know the medications you often use without getting a professional prescription  apart from paracetamol, let me tell you if it is safe or not.

lots of love,



Adenike Oladimeji.

3 Thoughts to “Why Self medication is Dangerous?”

  1. Helpful tips. Thankyou Nike!

    1. I am glad you found it helpful! thanks for stopping by.

  2. […] Why Self medication is Dangerous? […]

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