COMPARATIVE DESCRIPTIVE: LEVEL OF KNOWLEDGE AND ACNE SELFMEDICATION PATTERNS BETWEEN HEALTH AND NON-HEALTH STUDENTS IN MEDAN CITY

Acne is a skin health problem caused by the excessive production of oil (sebum), which appears on the face, neck, chest, and back; if not treated properly, it will leave scars. The aim of this study is to compare descriptively the level of knowledge and patterns on selfmedication acne between health and non-health students in Medan, Indonesia. This quantitative descriptive collected data through a survey via a Google form. The study's respondents were 206 students from 4 universities in Medan, North Sumatra, Indonesia. The sampling technique was probability sampling with Simple Random Sampling. The results of the present study show that the level of knowledge of self-medication for acne of health and non-health students was getting a score of 75.6% and 73.3%, respectively. The pattern of self-medication of health students tended to be better than non-health students because as many as 47.5% of health students did self-medication, while non-health students, 35.4% because they did not know the right way to care for their skin. The conclusion of this study is that the level of knowledge on acne self-medication in health and non-health students was almost similar, but on the pattern of self-medication, the health student was better than the non-health student.