Post-operative patients require analgesics. As large varieties of analgesics are available, irrational prescription is possible at times which can lead to unwanted side effects. Hence this study has been designed to evaluate the drug utilization pattern of analgesics among post-operative patients in a tertiary care teaching hospital, Pondicherry. A prospective observational cross-sectional study was conducted for a period of 2 months up to 3rd post-operative day and data was collected from the case sheets after getting approval from Institutional Research and Ethics committee and analysed by descriptive statistics. We observed 56 postoperative patients of which 45%(25) were male and 55%(31) were female. Of these 39%(22), 36%(20) and 25%(14) were from Generalsurgery, Obstetrics & gynaecology and Orthopaedic departments respectively. On the day of surgery Monotherapy was prescribed for 30(53%) patients of whichDiclofenac(60%) was the most commonly prescribed drug followed by Tramodal(37%) and Pentazocin(3%). Out of 45% patients combination oftramodal and diclofenac (56%) was commonly observed, followed by Diclofenac and Pentazocin(24%) and Tramodal with Pentazocin(20%). Three drug therapy of Diclofenac, tramadol and pentazocin was prescribed only in 2% of cases. Intra muscular administration was the most preferred route. This study has suggested that postoperative pain control was able to be achieved by nonopioid drug Diclofenac aloneitself and opioid analogues have been added to patients for whom pain relief could not be achieved. Utilization of analgesics was found to be based on the type of surgery and the physician’s preference.
