The default is actually the 600; a few times I’ve been asked “6 or 4?” and just gave the pharmacist an “are you kidding” look. But it’s supposed to be 1 tablet every 24h; if you find yourself needing more you’re supposed to see a doctor.
When my team arrived to Glasgow, we all got rentals and went to do some of our earliest shopping together. We had to explain to the supermarket’s manager that the reason for the 4 boxes of ibuprofen and 4 boxes of paracetamol was “three different households plus the first aid kit at the office”. We split it into two different purchases so it wouldn’t ping any automatic alarms (two boxes per purchase was ok). Those ibuprofens were 200mg and the paracetamols were 250mg (vs 500 or 1000mg in Spain). As one of my coworkers put it “so that’s why people in the movies always take fistfuls of pills, they’re minipills!”
Not true. My dr has told me to just take 600mg or more rarely 800mg at a time on occasion. I believe that the class of drug (NSAIDs) can upset the stomach, so users may be told to take with food. Not the same thing as something which purposefully upsets the stomach.
On the other hand, a pack of 16 costs about 20p ( 25c ) in the cheaper outlets, and you can buy 2 packs, go across the road and buy 2 more, and so to each shop, then go back to the first shop and find a different assistant ( not even that with an automatic customer self-serve machine ) until you have enough paracetamol to destroy your liver or whatever else is your goal.
I mean, it is really, really cheap.
Ibuprofen is RX-only in doses over 200mg/tablet primarily for insurance purposes. Also, if you have pain and/or inflammation severe enough that an 600- or 800mg dose in warranted, you probably need to be seen by a doctor anyway.
The maximum recommended dose for ibuprofen is 3200mg a day. Heavy long-term use can cause GI irritation and kidney damage.
It won’t be absorbed 200mg at a time unless you take the tablets at intervals. :smack: