Awareness and attitude of medical students over the misuse of topical steroids- Prospective study in 3rd year medical students in a Medical college, Tamil Nadu

Abstract

Topical corticosteroid’s anti-inflammatory action is the common property that induces the misuse of the topical steroids. Most of the time, even a medical graduate is misguided about the steroidal molecules in the combination formulation for the treatment of infections which gives temporary relief of symptoms such as itching and lightening effect in short term, But on long term will lead onto local adverse reactions such as dryness, burning sensation and striae etc. To analyse the knowledge of the medical students towards topical steroids and bridges the gaps in the knowledge.6 semester students who gave consent for the inclusion in the study were enrolled and a pretested validated questionaries were given to be filled. After the pretest, a video presentation of the topic was presented and the post test was given with the same format after 3 months. Results were analyzed using SPSS software.75% of the students heard about the topical steroids, out of which 57% were irrelevant steroid combination and 36% were Kligman’s formula. On comparing the pre and post test results, there is significant increase in the awareness regarding long term use of topical steroids (P<0.02) and the knowledge of the adverse events (P<0.01) and also the knowledge regarding the potency and area of application (P=0.003).Precise and adequate knowledge regarding topical steroid should be initiated in the early clinics in undergraduate curriculum and should be propagated or reinforced throughout the curriculum to prevent the misuse of topical steroids.