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Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines

BACKGROUND: The increasing use of complementary and alternative medicines in Australia has generated concern regarding the information on these products available to both healthcare providers and the public. The aim of this study was to examine the practice behaviours of naturopaths in relation to b...

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Autores principales: Smith, Caroline, Martin, Karen, Hotham, Elizabeth, Semple, Susan, Bloustien, Geraldine, Rao, Deepa
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2005
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182348/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16004617
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6882-5-15
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author Smith, Caroline
Martin, Karen
Hotham, Elizabeth
Semple, Susan
Bloustien, Geraldine
Rao, Deepa
author_facet Smith, Caroline
Martin, Karen
Hotham, Elizabeth
Semple, Susan
Bloustien, Geraldine
Rao, Deepa
author_sort Smith, Caroline
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: The increasing use of complementary and alternative medicines in Australia has generated concern regarding the information on these products available to both healthcare providers and the public. The aim of this study was to examine the practice behaviours of naturopaths in relation to both the provision of and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines (CAM). METHODS: A representative sample of 300 practicing naturopaths located nationally were sent a comprehensive survey which gathered data on self reported practice behaviour in relation to the provision of information on oral CAM to clients and the information needs of the practitioners themselves RESULTS: A response rate of 35% was achieved. Most practitioners (98%) have a dispensary within their clinic and the majority of practitioners perform the dispensing themselves. Practitioners reported they provided information to clients, usually in the form of verbal information (96%), handwritten notes (83%) and printed information (75%). The majority of practitioners (over 75%) reported always giving information on the full name of the product, reason for prescribing, expected response, possible interactions and contraindications and actions of the product. Information resources most often used by practitioners included professional newsletters, seminars run by manufacturers, patient feedback and personal observation of patients. Most practitioners were positive about the information they could access but felt that more information was required in areas such as adverse reactions and safe use of CAM in children, pregnancy and breastfeeding. Most naturopaths (over 96%) were informed about adverse events through manufacturer or distributor newsletters. The barriers in the provision of information to clients were misleading or incorrect information in the media, time constraints, information overload and complex language used in printed information. The main barrier to the practitioner in information access was seen as the perceived division between orthodox and complementary medicine practitioners. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest most naturopaths were concerned about possible interaction between pharmaceuticals and CAM, and explore this area with their patients. There is scope to improve practitioners' access to information of adverse events including an increased awareness of sources of information such as the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) website.
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spelling pubmed-11823482005-08-04 Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines Smith, Caroline Martin, Karen Hotham, Elizabeth Semple, Susan Bloustien, Geraldine Rao, Deepa BMC Complement Altern Med Research Article BACKGROUND: The increasing use of complementary and alternative medicines in Australia has generated concern regarding the information on these products available to both healthcare providers and the public. The aim of this study was to examine the practice behaviours of naturopaths in relation to both the provision of and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines (CAM). METHODS: A representative sample of 300 practicing naturopaths located nationally were sent a comprehensive survey which gathered data on self reported practice behaviour in relation to the provision of information on oral CAM to clients and the information needs of the practitioners themselves RESULTS: A response rate of 35% was achieved. Most practitioners (98%) have a dispensary within their clinic and the majority of practitioners perform the dispensing themselves. Practitioners reported they provided information to clients, usually in the form of verbal information (96%), handwritten notes (83%) and printed information (75%). The majority of practitioners (over 75%) reported always giving information on the full name of the product, reason for prescribing, expected response, possible interactions and contraindications and actions of the product. Information resources most often used by practitioners included professional newsletters, seminars run by manufacturers, patient feedback and personal observation of patients. Most practitioners were positive about the information they could access but felt that more information was required in areas such as adverse reactions and safe use of CAM in children, pregnancy and breastfeeding. Most naturopaths (over 96%) were informed about adverse events through manufacturer or distributor newsletters. The barriers in the provision of information to clients were misleading or incorrect information in the media, time constraints, information overload and complex language used in printed information. The main barrier to the practitioner in information access was seen as the perceived division between orthodox and complementary medicine practitioners. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest most naturopaths were concerned about possible interaction between pharmaceuticals and CAM, and explore this area with their patients. There is scope to improve practitioners' access to information of adverse events including an increased awareness of sources of information such as the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) website. BioMed Central 2005-07-11 /pmc/articles/PMC1182348/ /pubmed/16004617 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6882-5-15 Text en Copyright © 2005 Smith et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Smith, Caroline
Martin, Karen
Hotham, Elizabeth
Semple, Susan
Bloustien, Geraldine
Rao, Deepa
Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title_full Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title_fullStr Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title_full_unstemmed Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title_short Naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
title_sort naturopaths practice behaviour: provision and access to information on complementary and alternative medicines
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182348/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16004617
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6882-5-15
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