Self-medication behavior among pregnant women user of the Instituto nacional Materno Perinatal, Peru 2011

We aim to determine the prevalence of self prescribing behaviour during pregnancy and its characteristics. For this purpose, we designed a cross sectional study and interviewed 400 pregnant women who had their prenatal care at Instituto Nacional Materno Perinatal, Lima. We found that 10.5% of the patients (42 patients) had a self prescribing behavior during pregnancy, 64.5% think that self prescribing behavior can produce congenital malformations. The medications used were classified as type A and B according to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Paracetamol was used more frequently (47.6%) followed by amoxicillin (16.7%). All the women who self-prescribed have had this behavior before pregnancy. According to these results, we conclude there is a low prevalence of self-prescribing behavior during pregnancy compared to the international literature.