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. 1990 Jan 15;142(2):121–125.

Use of alternative medicine by patients attending a gastroenterology clinic.

M J Verhoef 1, L R Sutherland 1, L Brkich 1
PMCID: PMC1451702  PMID: 2295028

Abstract

We carried out a study to determine the proportion of patients attending a university-based gastroenterology outpatient clinic who sought alternative medical care for the same health problem that had prompted them to see a gastroenterologist. After the patients completed a self-administered questionnaire, the gastroenterologist gave a diagnosis and assigned a functional rating. Of the 395 patients 287 (73%) had not used alternative medicine, and 36 (9%) had sought alternative medical care for the problem that had prompted them to see a gastroenterologist. There were no significant differences between alternative medicine users and nonusers in sociodemographic characteristics, use of health care services or general health status. Patients with a functional disease were more likely to seek alternative medical care than those with organic disease (33% v. 7%) (p less than 0.0001). Fewer alternative medicine users (54%) than nonusers (85%) were satisfied with conventional medicine (p less than 0.001), and more alternative medicine users (49%) than nonusers (13%) were very sceptical of conventional medicine (p less than 0.0001).

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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