Knowledge and attitudes of healthcare professionals regarding alternative treatments

Recently, there seems to be an interest in complementary treatments, with the result that there is a noticeable increase in their use. Aim: The aim of the present study was to investigate knowledge and attitudes of healthcare professionals who work in a medium-sized general hospital, regarding employing alternative treatments in everyday practice. Method and material: The sample of the study comprised of 234 healthcare professionals from a General Hospital. A special, valid and anonymous questionnaire was used. Data collection took place from March to May 2013, and the SPSS 17.0 software was used for the statistical analysis (p < 0.05). Results: The majority of the participants were married (62.3%) female (75.6%) nurses (56.9%) of higher education level (46.1%), aged 47,08 ± 9,18 years. The majority knew what alternative treatments were and how they could be applied (79.2%, n=186), while 79 persons (33.8%) reported having used at least once some kind of an alternative treatment and 61.5% (n=143) of them said they were fairly/very satisfied with the results. 91% (n=211) of the participants said supervision should be necessary for the use of alternative treatments, and most of them were informed about those treatments by other healthcare professionals (38.8%), family or friends (38%), and the Internet (34,6%). Conclusions: Alternative treatments are a modern therapeutic approach that improves cooperation; healthcare professionals should acquire specialised knowledge regarding complementary treatments.

Keywords: Complementary therapies, alternative medicine, nursing education, integrative health, homeopathy, reflexology