The medicine use and corresponding subjective health complaints among adolescents, a cross-national survey

Inese Gobina, Raili Välimaa, Jorma Tynjälä, Jari Villberg, Anita Villerusa, Ronald J. Iannotti, Emmanuelle Godeau, Saoirse Nic Gabhainn, Anette Andersen, Bjørn E. Holstein

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

36 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Background: Medicine use among children and young people is under-researched. Studies that investigated cross-national patterns in adolescents' medicine use practice are rare. This study aims to investigate adolescents' medicine use for corresponding health complaints in Europe and USA. Methods: Nationally representative samples of adolescents from 19 countries and regions in Europe and USA completed an anonymous, standardised questionnaire as part of the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children 2005/2006 survey. The prevalence of health complaints and medicine use were determined. The influence of the frequency of medicine use, age, gender and country of residence, on the likelihood of medicine use was assessed using multilevel multivariate logistic regression, with separate analyses for boys and girls. Results: Both health complaints and medicine use were common among adolescents. Medicine use was strongly associated with the frequency of health complaints. The prevalence of both medicine use and health complaints was higher among girls than boys. Boys and girls with weekly health complaints were both similarly likely to report elevated rates of medicine use. Conclusions: The findings indicated that adolescents who report more frequent recurrent health complaints are also more likely to report more frequent medicine use for their health complaints. Adolescent boys with weekly health complaints have the same risk of medicine use as girls with weekly health complaints. The importance of educating school-aged children to interpret their bodily feelings and complaints and to use medicines appropriately is of high priority.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)424-431
Number of pages8
JournalPharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety
Volume20
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Apr 2011

Keywords*

  • Adolescence
  • Health complaints
  • Medicine use

Field of Science*

  • 3.3 Health sciences

Publication Type*

  • 1.1. Scientific article indexed in Web of Science and/or Scopus database

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