Background: Health and disease exist in a continuum. Self-care is as old as illness if not asrnhumans. Self-care is a lay behavioural response of individuals to promote or restore theirrnhealth. One form of self-care is self-medication. Drugs are central to self-medication.rnAlthough there are arguments for and against self-medication, its contribution to promoternhealth, and prevent and treat diseases is beyond doubt. Self-medication is the selection andrnuse of medicines by individuals to treat self-recognized illnesses or symptoms of illnesses.rnSocio-demographic and socio-economic variables affect self-medication. In this study, anrnattempt has been made to assess self-medication practices with modern drugs and consumersrndrug knowledge in Addis Ababa.rnMethods: A multi-stage stratified sampling of drug retail outlets and drug consumers (actualrndrug users and messengers) was designed and used. Structured questionnaires to assessrnprospective self-medication practices and consumers drug knowledge were employed. Therndata was analyzed using Epi Info Software.rnResults and Discussion: The respondents represented all socio-demographic characteristicsrnsuch as age and gender (the proportion of males was twice that of females); education levelsrnand occupation; religion (the majority being Orthodox Christians) as well as pregnant andrnbreast-feeding women. The most frequently reported illnesses that prompted drug consumersrnfor self-medication were found to be gastrointestinal (GI) diseases, headache/fever andrnrespiratory tract infections (RTIs). More than 30% of illnesses/symptoms of illnesses were ofrnless than 24 hours duration and more than 40% between one and seven days. The mostrncommon reasons for self-diagnosis and self-medication were non-seriousness of the diseasesrnand prior experience about the drugs. More than 50% of the drug consumers requested drugsrnxirnby specifically mentioning the names of the drugs and one-fifth of them by telling theirrnillnesses/symptoms of illnesses. The most frequently requested category of drugs werernanalgesics/antipyretics (more than 30%), antimicrobials (more than 25%) and gastrointestinalrndrugs (more than 17%). Assessment of drug knowledge revealed that drug consumers knowrnnot only the names of OTC drugs but also other potent drugs, indicating widespread use of thernlatter. For example, among the top fifteen frequently recalled drugs five were antimicrobials.rnDrug consumers had also some dosage form preferences, the highest being injections andrntablets for messengers and for actual drug users, respectively. Multivariate analysis showedrnthat there is association between illness/symptoms of illness with the duration of illness andrnsource of advice/information for self-medication (p value less than 0.05). Strong associationrn(p value = 0.0000) was observed between the source of advice/information and the frequentlyrnrequested category of drugs, some socio-demographic variables with sources ofrnadvice/information, knowledge of drugs, and the frequently requested category of drugs.rnConclusion: Self-medication is widely practiced by all categories of respondents for a widernrange of illnesses/symptoms of illnesses. More than 100 different types of drugs were used forrnself-medication. Although there is some apparent consumers drug knowledge, it is suggestedrnthat the public has to be educated on the type of illnesses to be self-diagnosed and the type ofrndrugs to be self-medicated. It is only then that responsible self-medication prevails to promoternhealth and prevent/ treat illnesses.