Common Medicines in Vietnam — Local Names and What's Actually Over the Counter

How Pharmacies Work in Vietnam, The Honest Version

Vietnam's over-the-counter culture is genuinely different from what most visitors are used to. A wide range of medicines that would require a prescription in the UK, the EU, Australia or North America are sold across the counter here on request, including many antibiotics. This is a factual description of how things work on the ground, not a recommendation. Formally, a prescription is required for a good many of these products; in day-to-day practice at most pharmacies, you can ask for them and be handed a box.

The practical consequence is the opposite of what people usually assume. A permissive counter doesn't mean you can relax about what you take, it means the filter that normally sits between you and a medicine has been removed, and you're now doing that thinking yourself. Nobody will stop you buying the wrong thing for your symptoms, something that interacts badly with a medication you already take, or an antibiotic for an illness that isn't bacterial. You don't have to navigate that alone, though, in Da Nang, an English speaking doctor in Da Nang can examine you directly, and in Ho Chi Minh City, a home doctor in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) can do the same at your hotel or apartment.

The good news is that the everyday, genuinely useful items are cheap and easy to find. Pharmacies (nhà thuốc, marked with a green cross) sit on almost every block in Da Nang, Hoi An and Ho Chi Minh City, and are present even in small towns like Phong Nha and Dong Hoi. Prices at the national chains are fixed and posted, so there is no haggling and no tourist markup on medicine.

Getting understood at the counter

Vietnamese pharmacists are, as a rule, helpful and used to foreign customers, but English varies enormously from one shop and one shift to the next. The reliable approach is visual: show your phone screen with the medicine name typed out, a photo of the box from home, or a short translated sentence describing the symptom. Written words travel across a language gap far better than spoken ones, because Vietnamese is tonal and an unfamiliar pronunciation of a drug name often lands as nothing at all. There's a list of phrases to show further down this page. If you take a regular medication, photograph its packaging before you travel, the generic name in small type is what a pharmacist here will recognise, even when the brand name means nothing.

Vietnamese Names You'll See on the Box

Vietnamese pharmacies stock familiar medicines under brand names most visitors have never encountered. This table is the quick version, what to ask for by category, so you can find it fast and read the details further down the page.

Motilium is the one worth knowing by name if you haven't heard of it: it's domperidone, used here for nausea and the bloated, sluggish stomach that can follow a spell of food poisoning or a big change in diet. Tiffy and Decolgen are combination cold-and-flu tablets, paracetamol plus a decongestant and sometimes an antihistamine, genuinely useful for a blocked nose and aches, but check the label if you're already taking paracetamol separately, since it's easy to double up without noticing. Salonpas covers the medicated patches and rubs for sore shoulders, backs and knees after a long trek or a scooter tumble.

Rehydration: Oresol and Hydrite

Oresol is the name virtually every Vietnamese pharmacist uses for oral rehydration salts. It comes as a sachet of glucose and electrolytes that you dissolve in bottled water. It costs a few thousand dong, it's stocked absolutely everywhere, and it's the single most useful thing in this entire guide. Hydrite is a comparable product sold as effervescent tablets that dissolve into the same kind of solution, either is fine, and pharmacists will often offer whichever they have to hand.

It treats fluid loss from any cause: diarrhea, vomiting, and the heat-related loss that catches people out in Central Vietnam's summer or on a long day walking in Ho Chi Minh City. Plain water doesn't replace the sodium and potassium you're losing, and drinking a lot of it while losing salts can make you feel worse.

It's worth being clear about status: oral rehydration is not a budget substitute for an IV drip. It's the first-line treatment, the one that resolves the large majority of cases on its own. A drip becomes the better option only when you can't keep anything down at all, or when you're losing fluid faster than you can drink it back. Follow the mixing instructions printed on the sachet rather than guessing, the concentration matters more than most people expect.

Diarrhea and Stomach Upset

This is the category travellers ask about most, and three names cover almost all of it.

• Smecta (diosmectite), the most recognisable diarrhea medicine brand in Vietnam, and the one Chinese-speaking visitors know as 舒腹達. A clay-based powder you mix with water, it coats the gut lining and firms stools gently without stopping the bowel doing its job. Widely used here for adults and, at adjusted amounts, for children. A box of sachets costs a few tens of thousands of dong. If you buy one diarrhea product besides Oresol, this is usually the sensible one.
• Berberin, a traditional Vietnamese over-the-counter antidiarrhoeal derived from berberine, a plant alkaloid. Small yellow tablets, sold in nearly every pharmacy, extremely cheap, and something many Vietnamese households keep at home. A mild option, popular locally for ordinary stomach upsets.
• Loperamide (Imodium), the stop button. Sold under the Imodium brand and various generic names, and available at any pharmacy in Vietnam.

When loperamide is appropriate: uncomplicated watery diarrhea with no fever and no blood, where you have a practical reason to press pause, a long bus transfer, a flight, a day you simply cannot spend near a bathroom. Used this way in an otherwise healthy adult, it's reasonable and it works.

When it isn't: if you have a fever, blood or mucus in your stool, or suspected food poisoning with systemic symptoms such as severe cramping, shaking chills or feeling profoundly unwell. In those situations the diarrhea is your body clearing something out, and suppressing the symptom can trap the problem inside while hiding how ill you actually are. That combination needs assessment, not symptom suppression. It's also not an appropriate choice for young children.

For the fuller picture, prevention, what to eat, when it stops being a wait-it-out illness, and when IV rehydration is the right call, see our dedicated guide to traveler's diarrhea in Vietnam.

Fever and Pain: Paracetamol Under Local Brand Names

Paracetamol, acetaminophen, if you learned the American name, is sold in Vietnam under several brands you'll see on every shelf:

• Panadol, the internationally familiar name, widely stocked in Vietnam and easy to ask for.
• Efferalgan, the French-origin brand, usually as effervescent tablets that dissolve in water. Common in Vietnam and useful if you're nauseated and don't want to swallow a tablet.
• Hapacol, a Vietnamese-made paracetamol brand, cheap and stocked essentially universally, including children's preparations.

All three are the same active ingredient in different packaging. Follow the amounts printed on the leaflet or ask the pharmacist. The cautions that matter: avoid alcohol while taking it, be careful if you have liver problems, and, this catches people out, check whether any cold-and-flu combination product you're also taking already contains paracetamol, since doubling up unknowingly is the commonest way people overshoot.

Why ibuprofen carries an extra caution in Vietnam specifically

Ibuprofen, aspirin, diclofenac and other NSAIDs are all available here, and in many countries they're an unremarkable choice for fever. In Vietnam there's a specific reason to prefer paracetamol for a fever whose cause you don't yet know, and it's worth understanding rather than just accepting.

Dengue is common throughout Vietnam, including in the cities most visitors spend time in. In its first days it looks like ordinary flu, fever, headache, aching, and there's no reliable way to tell it apart from other fevers by symptoms alone that early. Dengue lowers platelet counts and affects clotting, which is why bleeding complications are what doctors watch for. NSAIDs also affect platelets and irritate the stomach lining, so taking them during dengue adds to a risk that's already elevated. That's the mechanism, and it's why NSAIDs are avoided in suspected dengue everywhere it's endemic.

The practical rule that follows is simple: for an undiagnosed fever in Vietnam, paracetamol is the safer default. NSAIDs are perfectly reasonable for something like a sprained ankle or period pain where the cause is obvious and fever isn't part of the picture, the caution is specifically about fevers of unknown origin. Our dengue fever guide covers the timeline, the warning signs, and how testing works.

Heartburn, Reflux and Antacids

This category is reassuringly similar to home. Vietnamese pharmacies stock the usual antacid suspensions and chewable tablets for immediate relief, along with the acid-reducing tablets most travellers will recognise by their generic names, the H2 blockers and the proton pump inhibitors such as omeprazole and its relatives. Some carry international brands, many are Vietnamese generics with unfamiliar box designs but the same active ingredient printed on the back.

Reflux and indigestion are common complaints among visitors, for unglamorous reasons: more chilli than you're used to, more coffee, more beer and later meals. If symptoms are new, severe, or come with difficulty swallowing, unexplained weight loss, black stools or chest pain, that's not an antacid problem and it should be looked at properly.

Antihistamines for Bites, Rashes and Mild Allergic Reactions

Antihistamines are freely available in Vietnam and among the more genuinely useful things to keep in a hotel room. Both generations are stocked: the older sedating ones such as chlorpheniramine, cheap but drowsy-making, and the newer non-sedating ones such as loratadine and cetirizine, the better choice with a day of sightseeing ahead. Pharmacists recognise all of these by their generic names.

The usual reasons travellers reach for one here are mosquito and sandfly bites that itch out of proportion, heat rash, contact reactions to unfamiliar plants or laundry detergent, and mild allergic reactions to food. Soothing topical creams for bites are stocked alongside them.

An important boundary: antihistamines are for mild reactions. Swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, difficulty breathing, widespread hives with faintness, or any reaction that's escalating quickly is a medical emergency, that's an ambulance and adrenaline, not a pharmacy purchase. If you carry an adrenaline auto-injector for a known allergy, bring it with you rather than expecting to source one here.

Motion Sickness, Boats and Mountain Roads

Vietnam gives motion sickness plenty of opportunities: day boats to the Cham Islands off Hoi An, overnight cruises in Halong Bay, the river trips around Hoi An, and, the one that surprises people, road transfers. The Hai Van Pass between Da Nang and Hue is a sustained sequence of switchbacks, the mountain roads around Phong Nha are similar, and a sleeper bus on a winding highway defeats plenty of people who are fine on boats.

Pharmacies sell the standard options: antihistamine-type tablets such as dimenhydrinate and cinnarizine, and scopolamine patches worn behind the ear. Ask by generic name, or simply say you need something for boat or car sickness. Two practical points: these work best taken before you travel rather than once you already feel unwell, and most cause drowsiness, fine on a boat, less fine if you're the one riding the motorbike.

Sunburn, Cuts and Skin Care

Sun here is stronger than most visitors plan for, particularly on the beaches at My Khe and An Bang and on open boat decks where reflected light does half the damage. Pharmacies stock high-factor sunscreen, often cheaper than hotel shops, along with after-sun gels and aloe vera preparations for the soothing stage once you've overdone it. A sunburn with blistering, fever or feeling unwell has crossed from cosmetic into a burn that deserves medical attention.

For cuts, grazes and the near-universal scooter scrape, the item to know by name is Betadine, povidone-iodine antiseptic, sold in the distinctive brown bottle in essentially every Vietnamese pharmacy for very little money. It's the local default for cleaning a wound and it's good at the job. Alongside it you'll find saline, sterile gauze, adhesive dressings, micropore tape and antiseptic wipes, all cheap.

Vietnam's humidity means minor wounds get infected more readily than at home. Clean any break in the skin promptly and keep it covered when you're out, and treat spreading redness, increasing pain after the first day, pus or a fever as a signal to be seen rather than to buy something stronger over the counter. Animal bites and scratches are a separate matter, those need same-day assessment for rabies risk.

Antibiotics, Available Doesn't Mean Advisable

This is the part that needs the most care, and the question the search engines get asked most often: can you buy amoxicillin over the counter in Vietnam? In practice, usually yes. Amoxicillin, azithromycin, cephalosporins and others are commonly handed over on request at Vietnamese pharmacies. That's the honest situation, and pretending otherwise wouldn't help anyone.

What follows from it is a question of judgement rather than legality. Being able to buy an antibiotic doesn't put you in a position to prescribe one, and here's specifically why that matters:

• The wrong drug for the actual infection does nothing useful. Antibiotics don't touch viruses, which cause most sore throats, colds, coughs and a fair share of stomach bugs. Taking one for a viral illness gives you side effects and no benefit, and disrupts gut flora that's often already struggling.
• Incomplete courses are the norm when people self-treat. You feel better, you stop, and you leave behind the hardier organisms. That's the mechanism by which resistance builds, and it isn't abstract in this region, the wide availability of over-the-counter antibiotics across Southeast Asia has produced resistant strains that make some older standbys unreliable here. Choosing an agent that still works locally is not a guessing game.
• Antibiotics mask things. Start a course, feel marginally better for reasons that may have nothing to do with the drug, and you delay the diagnosis of what's actually wrong. This matters most with fever: if your fever is dengue, an antibiotic does nothing for it, and the days you spend waiting for it to work are the days when dengue's warning signs typically appear.

So: just because you can buy it doesn't mean you should self-prescribe it. And there's a useful reframing hidden in that. If you're ill enough to be considering an antibiotic, you're ill enough that someone should examine you, which is a much more informative use of the same afternoon. A doctor can determine whether the infection is even bacterial, choose something that still works in Vietnam, check for what a pharmacy counter can't see, and rule out the causes of fever that look ordinary at first. In Da Nang, Hoi An, Ho Chi Minh City, Phong Nha and Dong Hoi that doesn't have to mean a clinic waiting room, a home or hotel visit puts an English-speaking doctor in the room with you, able to examine, test, and prescribe properly where it's genuinely warranted.

What NOT to Self-Treat

Most of this page is about the categories where buying something yourself is a reasonable choice. A few categories aren't, and it's worth being direct about which ones and why.

• Antibiotics. Covered in full above: available on request at most pharmacies, but the wrong choice does nothing for a viral illness, an incomplete course encourages resistance, and starting one can mask a fever that's actually dengue.
• Codeine and other opioid painkillers. A common search is whether codeine can be bought over the counter in a Vietnamese pharmacy. It's controlled here, more strictly than antibiotics, and pharmacies are noticeably more cautious about handing it over without a prescription than the reputation of "anything goes" suggests. Some codeine-containing products familiar from home aren't stocked at all. If you take a codeine-based medication regularly and are running low, that's a situation for a doctor visit rather than pharmacy-hopping, both because supply is inconsistent and because an opioid isn't something to source through trial and error in an unfamiliar system.
• Oral or injectable corticosteroids. These are more freely available here than in many countries, and that accessibility outpaces how safe they are to self-dose. Steroids can suppress your immune response at exactly the moment you might have an infection that needs treating, mess with blood sugar, and mask symptoms without fixing the underlying cause. A short topical steroid cream for a rash is a different matter and fine to use as directed; tablets or injections are not a self-treatment decision.

The theme across all three: availability at the counter tells you nothing about whether a medicine is the right choice for what you actually have. That's a diagnostic question, and it's the reason a doctor visit, at your hotel or apartment, not a clinic queue, is often the faster path to feeling better, not a slower one.

Buying With Confidence, Practical Tips

Counterfeit and improperly stored medicine exists in Vietnam, as it does across the region. The risk is not evenly spread, and a few habits reduce it substantially.

• Use an established pharmacy chain. Chains such as Long Chau, Pharmacity and An Khang are large national operations with branches in every city covered by this guide. They carry tracked stock, post fixed prices, print receipts, and store medicine in air conditioning, which matters more in a tropical climate than people realise. That reduces counterfeit risk; it doesn't eliminate it, and no shop can promise that. Small independent pharmacies are often perfectly good too, but an unmarked stall selling loose tablets from a jar is a different proposition.
• Check the expiry date before you leave the counter. It's printed on the box, usually as HSD (hạn sử dụng) with the date. Ask if you can't find it.
• Look at the packaging. Blister foil should be intact and unpunctured, seals unbroken, printing crisp rather than smudged, and the box free of the slightly-off colours and typos that mark a bad copy. If a box looks like it's been opened and re-taped, decline it.
• Photograph what you buy. A photo of the box showing the medicine name and the strength printed on it means that if you do end up seeing a doctor, they can see exactly what you've already taken instead of relying on your memory of a Vietnamese brand name you'd never heard of two days earlier. It also prevents accidental duplication when a second pharmacy sells you the same active ingredient under a different name.
• Keep the receipt. Pharmacy purchases are usually claimable on travel insurance alongside a doctor's visit, and the chains print itemised receipts as standard.

Useful Phrases at the Pharmacy

Show these on your phone screen rather than trying to pronounce them, written Vietnamese travels across a language gap far better than an unfamiliar accent does:

• "Tôi cần thuốc cho..." (Toy kun too-ock cho) = "I need medicine for..."
• "Tôi bị tiêu chảy" (Toy bee tyew chai) = "I have diarrhea"
• "Tôi bị sốt" (Toy bee shot) = "I have a fever"
• "Tôi bị đau bụng" (Toy bee dow boong) = "I have stomach pain"
• "Tôi bị dị ứng" (Toy bee zee oong) = "I have an allergic reaction"
• "Tôi đang uống thuốc này" (Toy dang oo-ong too-ock nai) = "I am already taking this medicine", say this while showing the box

One more word worth recognising on a sign: nhà thuốc means pharmacy, and it's what you're looking for under the green cross.

When the Pharmacy Is the Wrong Answer

Any of these moves you out of self-care territory. 115 is Vietnam's emergency number; operators rarely speak English, so ask hotel reception to call for you. Short of an emergency, a home visit is the sensible middle path, a licensed, English-speaking doctor comes to your hotel, apartment or homestay in Da Nang, Hoi An, Ho Chi Minh City, Phong Nha or Dong Hoi, examines you properly, and can prescribe on the spot if that's what's actually needed.

For everything else on staying well here, browse our full library of health guides for Vietnam.