OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to assess the prescribing trends in the intensive care unit of a tertiary care hospital.

METHODS: This was a retrospective cross-sectional study of 150 patients who attended to intensive care unit in our tertiary care hospital from February 2017 to June 2017.

RESULTS: Of 150 patients 54.7% (82 patients) were males and 45.3% (68 patients) were females. More number of patients (36%) were prescribed with 4-6 drugs, followed by 24% of patients with 7-9 drugs, 22% with 1-3 drugs and 18% with 10-12 drugs. Most commonly prescribed drugs are NSAIDs (38%), followed by GI drugs (19%), CNS drugs (13%), CVS drugs (11%), anti infective drugs (10%) and others (9%). Of all these 51% of drugs were administered by oral route, 38% of drugs by parenteral route and 6% by other routes.

CONCLUSIONS: NSAIDs were the most frequent class of drugs administered to patients. Highest number of drugs was prescribed for gastrointestinal diseases, followed by neurological and cardiovascular diseases. The results of the present study were attempts to highlight the importance of strategies that have to be implemented to optimise medication use at the ICU.