Prevalence and Current Practices of Self-Medication among Students of the Biomedicine Degree at the Health Sciences School

Self-medication is often seen as a solution for the immediate relief of symptoms, however, bringing serious consequences to consumer\u27s health and serious public health problems in Brazil and the world. Still, regarding self-medication, the conduct of University students in the health area is observed, since the habit in this group is high. Given these facts and the need for epidemiological and toxicological evidence on self-medication of this school group, this study aims to verify the prevalence of self-medication in Biomedicine Degree students of the Universidade Brasil. It is a cross-sectional study conducted with 63 scholars from the first three graduation years of the Biomedicine degree at the Universidade Brasil, in Fernandópolis, São Paulo. A validated questionnaire with social and medication consumption variables was applied, followed by statistical analysis by the Mann-Whitney test. As a result, self-medication was considered an option for 59 of the participants, most of them juniors, female, aged between 18 and 20, with no previous college degree, with medical insurance and aware of possible health risks, even after access to classes or online surveys. The clinical condition preceding self-medication included mainly headache, myalgia, fever, and allergies. There was a preference for anthelmintic, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, antipyretic medication, mainly antibiotics, and central nervous system stimulants. The habit of self-medication increases, gradually, during the graduation period, therefore is suggested the implementation of an educational campaign in the Biomedicine course curriculum to undo this cycle of chemical substance consumption

Meiotic chromosomes and nucleolar behavior in testicular cells of the grassland spittlebugs Deois flavopicta, Mahanarva fimbriolata and Notozulia entreriana (Hemiptera, Auchenorrhyncha)

Spittlebugs annually infest pastures and cause severe damage, representing a serious problem for the tropical American beef cattle industry. Spittlebugs are an important biotic constraint to forage production and there is a lack of cytogenetic data for this group of insects. For these reasons, we conducted this work, in which the spermatogenesis and nucleolar behavior of Deois flavopicta, Mahanarva fimbriolata and Notozulia entreriana were studied. The males possessed testes in the shape of a “bunch of grapes”; a variable number of testicular lobes per individual and polyploid nuclei composed of several heteropycnotic bodies. A heteropycnotic area was located in the periphery of the nucleus (prophase I); the chiasmata were terminal or interstitial; metaphases I were circular or linear and anaphase showed late migration of the sex chromosome. The chromosome complement had 2n = 19, except for N. entreriana (2n = 15); the spermatids were round with heteropycnotic material in the center and elongated with conspicuos chromatin. The analysis of testes after silver nitrate staining showed polyploid nuclei with three large and three smaller nucleolar bodies. Early prophase cells had an intensely stained nucleolar body located close to the chromatin and another less evident body located away from the chromatin. The nucleolar bodies disintegrated during diplotene. Silver staining occurred in two autosomes, in terminal and subterminal locations, the latter probably corresponding to the nucleolus organizer regions (NORs). The spermatids were round with a round nucleolar body and silver staining was observed in the medial and posterior region of the elongated part of the spermatid head