Heart

A person can overdose when taking certain drugs if they exceed the recommended dosage, including when using ibuprofen. Ibuprofen is a pain reliever drug that can usually be easily found on the market or sold over the counter without a doctor's prescription. When you overdose on ibuprofen, you can experience various side effects that are harmful to the body. For more details, here are the reviews.

What is ibuprofen?

Ibuprofen is a nonsteorid anti-inflammatory drug used to treat inflammation, fever, and mild pain. Usually, this drug is used to treat:

Headache
Back pain
Tooth ache
Arthritis
Menstrual cramps
Fever

Ibuprofen works by lowering hormones that cause inflammation and pain. In addition, this drug also works by disrupting the normal functioning of the nervous system by altering the pain signals captured by nerve cells.

On the market, ibuprofen has various brands including:

Motrin
Advil
Midol
Nuprin
Pamprin IB

What is a safe dose of ibuprofen?

Ibuprofen is usually safe to use for adults and children older than 6 months. However, this also depends on the health condition of each person. People with heart disease, stomach or intestinal problems, and a history of blood clots should not usually take this drug.

For adults, the recommended dosage is one or two 200 mg tablets every four to six hours. Adults should not take more than 800 mg at a time or 3,200 mg per day.

However, a safe dose given is 1200-1600 mg per day. Meanwhile, people over 60 years of age have a higher risk of kidney and gastrointestinal damage, so the dosage needs to be reduced on the advice of a doctor.

Meanwhile, the dosage for children will be adjusted to their height and age. So you can't just give it without instructions from a doctor. Generally, children are given no more than four doses per day. Oral drops, syrups, and chewable tablets are types of ibuprofen for babies and children.

It should also be noted, if you are taking drugs other than ibuprofen try to take it eight hours before or 30 minutes after other medicines such as aspirin, ketoprofen, or naproxen.

Symptoms of an ibuprofen overdose

Symptoms of an ibuprofen overdose sometimes don't appear immediately after you take it. However, this may vary from person to person. Symptoms that occur are divided into mild and severe.

The following are various mild symptoms that you will experience, namely:

Ringing in ears
Heartburn
Nausea
Gag
Diarrhea
Dizzy
Heartburn to gastrointestinal bleeding
Blurred vision
Red rash on the skin
Sweating for no apparent reason
Stomach pain due to bleeding in the body

The various symptoms are quite severe, namely:

Difficulty breathing
Seizures
Blood pressure is too low (hypotension)
Little or no urine output due to impaired kidneys
Severe headaches
Coma

Meanwhile, in infants, the symptoms include lethargy, not responding quickly, and apnea or temporary stopping breathing.

Doctor's care when you have an ibuprofen overdose

When you experience these symptoms, then immediately go to the nearest hospital. The doctor will look at your breathing rate, heart rate and other vital signs. Usually, the doctor will also insert a device through the mouth to look for internal bleeding if you have stomach pain.

The doctor will also perform a number of treatments such as:

Medicines that make you vomit.
Rinse the stomach, if the medicine was taken within the last hour.
Activated charcoal.
Purgative.
Breathing apparatus such as oxygen or a ventilator.
Intravenous fluids.

Complications from an ibuprofen overdose

In some cases, an overdose of ibuprofen can cause serious problems with your gastrointestinal tract which include:

Inflammation
Bleeding
Ulcer wounds
Stroke
Heart attack
Intestinal perforation, when the intestine leaks until its contents enter the abdominal cavity.
Kidney or liver failure

Therefore, to avoid the symptoms of an overdose, you need to carefully read the doctor's recommendations and the drinking rules on the packaging label. Make sure to take it as recommended without overdoing it or reducing the dosage.