Title: The availability and competence of paracetamol in headaches.

Thesis: While Paracetamol an analgesic can be harmful as it may worsen or trigger ulcer and

some allergic reactions, paracetamol with a very low half life, is a common analgesic used to

treat aches and pains, combines with most other drugs and is safe to take in pregnancy even

while breastfeeding.

Here is my last week quantitative research methodology assignment which had a topic on

paracetamol, an analgesic and headache.

I wanted to do a research on individual's experience of headache and their choices of medications

for it. So I chose a quantitative research method because through it I could come up with a

questionnaire that can allow me to organize my questions in a way that is easy to understand, to

find out what percentage of people of Okofia that uses a particular medication for headache.

1. What is your Gender?

☐ Male ☐ Female.
 6 persons ticked female, indicating that they are of the female gender, and 4 persons

picked mal indicating that they are of the male gender. This means that 60% were female

and 40% were male.

2. How old are you?

☐ 10-20 years. ☐ 21-30 years. ☐ 31-40years. ☐ 41and above

3 persons ticked 10-20, 4 persons ticked 21-30, 2 persons ticked 31-40 and 1 person

chose 41 and above. It was indicated that 30% of the persons were between the ages of

10-20 years, 40% were between the ages of 21-30 years, 20% were between the ages of

31-40 and just 10% were between the ages of 41 and above.

3. Have you ever had headache before?

☐ YES. ☐ NO

10 persons ticked YES and no one ticked NO, this indicates that 100% of the population

have had headache before.

4. How often do you have headache?

☐ Daily. ☐ Weekly. ☐ Monthly. ☐ Yearly.

5 persons ticked Daily, 3 persons ticked weekly, 2 persons ticked and 0 person ticked

yearly.
 This indicates that 50% of the individuals experience headache on daily basis, 30% of the

individuals have headache weekly, 20% have headache on monthly basis and 0% have

headache on yearly basis.

5. Do you go the hospital when you have headache?

☐ Yes. ☐ No. ☐ Sometimes.

Yes was ticked 2 times, No was ticked 7 times and sometimes was ticked once. This

indicates that 70% of the population don’t go to the hospital when they have headache,

while 20% go to the hospital and 10% do go to the hospital sometimes when they have

headache.

6. What do you do when you have headache?

☐ Sleep. ☐ Medications. ☐ Drinks. ☐ Exercise.

1 person ticked sleep, 5 persons ticked medications, and 2 people ticked drinks and 2

others ticked exercise. This indicates that 10% sleep when they experience headache,

50% take medications when they experience headache, 20% take drinks when thy

experience headache and the other 20% do exercises when they experience headache.

If you ticked medications then, else skip.

7. What type of medications do you take?

☐ Paractemol.
  Aspirin.

 Codeine.

 Fentanyl.

 Mepridine.

☐ Naloxone.

☐ Oxycodone.

☐ Opioids.

☐ Morphine.

☐ Others.

If you ticked others, simply write the name of the medication

down…………………………..

3 persons ticked paractemol, 1 person ticked opioids, 1 person ticked Aspirin and 0 person ticked

Codeine, Fentanyl, Mepridine, Naloxone, Oxycodone, Morphine and others.

This indicates that 60% of the individuals that use medications use paractemol when they feel

headache, 20% of the individuals use opioids and another 20% of the individuals use Aspirin.

8. Where do you normally get the medications?

☐ Pharmacy. ☐ Over the counter. ☐ Pharmaceutical companies. ☐ Friends.

 Over the counter was ticked 4 times while friends where ticked once. This indicates that

80% of the population get their medications over the counter while the other 20% get the

medications from their friends.

The above were the results collected from my research conducted among the residents of Okofia

in Nigeria between the ages of 10 and above with all the population indicating that they have had

headache with 50% indicating the frequency to be on daily basis while 30% and 20% indicated

the frequency to be weekly and monthly basis respectively.

From the result, 70% of the population don’t go to the hospital when they have headache, while

30% go or don’t always go to the hospital. Also, 50% of this population make use of medications

when they have headache of which 60% of them make use of paractemol and 40% use either

Aspirin or Opioids which they get over the counter or from their friends, while the other 50%

either sleep, drink or exercise.

Conclusion.

Headache is a prevalent symptom in this community, however, despite that paracetamol is

common, it's competence is still a top notch because a greater percentage of this population

don’t go to the hospital for proper diagnosis rather they choose to purchase more of paractemol

whenever they experience headache.