Awareness and Disposal Practices of Medicines among the Community in Hawassa City, Ethiopia

Table 10

Associations between respondents’ socioeconomic status and practices of ELU medicine disposal.

Variable	Frequency (%)	Gender		Age (year)		Family size (number)		Educational^a status		Family income (ETB)
		Male	Female	≤35	>35	≤4	>4	Grade 1–12	College & above	≤5000	>5000
How do you dispose of expired medicines? (N = 402)
Throw them in the garbage	272 (66.5)	97 (35.7)	175 (64.3)	184 (67.6)	88 (32.4)	155 (57.0)	117 (43.0)	57 (22.9)	192 (77.1)	90 (33.1)	182 (66.9)
Bury underground	16 (4.1)	7 (43.8)	9 (56.3)	11 (68.8)	5 (31.3)	12 (75)	4 (25)	2 (16.7)	10 (83.3)	1 (6.3)	15 (93.8)
Throw/flush them in the toilet	83 (21.4)	23 (27.7)	60 (72.3)	53 (63.9)	30 (36.1)	46 (55.4)	37 (44.6)	19 (25.7)	55 (74.3)	34 (41)	49 (59)
Burn them	31 (8.0)	9 (29.0)	22 (71.0)	24 (77.4)	7 (22.6)	17 (54.8)	14 (45.2)	9 (31)	20 (69)	13 (41.9)	18 (58.1)
		χ^2 = 2.79, p = 0.42		χ^2 = 1.91, p = 0.59		χ^2 = 2.25, p = 0.52		χ^2 = 1.24, p = 0.74		χ^2 = 7.70, p = 0.05
What do you do with unexpired but leftover/unused medicines? (N = 402)
Keep them until they expire	101 (25.1)	37 (36.6)	64 (63.4)	75 (74.3)	26 (25.7)	70 (69.3)	31 (30.7)	10 (11.8)	75 (88.2)	32 (31.7)	69 (66.3)
Dispose them as expired medicine	301 (74.9)	99 (32.9)	202 (67.1)	197 (65.4)	104 (34.6)	160 (53.2)	141 (46.8)	77 (27.6)	202 (72.4)	106 (33.1)	195 (66.9)
		χ^2 = 0.41, p = 0.51		χ^2 = 3.01, p = 0.82		χ^2 = 8.13, p = 0.004		χ^2 = 8.32, p = 0.004		χ^2 = 0.40, p = 0.524

^a(N = 364); thirty-eight respondents were excluded from the educational status in this study because their levels of education were out of the given range.