Beliefs and attitudes towards complementary medicine among registered nurses in Hong Kong.
BACKGROUND
The personal use of and professional recommendation for complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has been found to be related to nurses' knowledge and type of training background. Little, however, is known about CAM usage among nurses from Hong Kong who while of Chinese origin, are educated in western medical principles while exhibiting both folk knowledge and lay use of CAM in their daily lives.


OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to investigate the beliefs and attitudes towards CAM in a population of Hong Kong registered nurses. A particular focus was the sources of CAM information and the nurse's professional communication exchanges about CAM usage.


METHODS
Cross-sectional survey.


METHODS
The survey was conducted from March to June 2006 with registered nurses (N=187) drawn form the Hong Kong College of Nursing.


RESULTS
Nearly three quarters (71.9%) of the nurses agreed that CAM should be integrated into mainstream Western medicine. The majority (89.8%) of participants did not agree that CAM should not be taken when using Western medicine. The most common sources for the nurses surveyed to obtain CAM information were, in order of frequency, newspapers and magazines (64.2%), friends (57.2%) and books (43.9%). Approximately one in three (28.0-35.3%) participants had either sometimes or frequently initiated a discussion about CAM or a discussion about the interaction between CAM and Western medicine with nursing colleague. Consistently, nurses who had previously received training on CAM (48.9%) were also more likely to initiate CAM discussions than those who had not received such training (30.7%, p<0.05).


CONCLUSIONS
More knowledge of CAM was in general, welcomed among nurses, with 93.6% of the nurses surveyed reporting an interest in further learning. A major recommendation is that HK registered nurses receive professional CAM training as a means to enhance patient care.
Holroyd
Eleanor
E
Division of Nursing and Midwifery, School of Health Sciences, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. Eleanor.holdroyd@rmit.edu.au
Zhang
Anthony L
AL
Suen
Lorna K P
LK
Xue
Charlie C L
CC
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D000529:Complementary Therapies / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000193:education / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000523:psychology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003479:Curriculum; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006723:Hong Kong; D006801:Humans; D055048:Integrative Medicine / Q000193:education / Q000458:organization & administration; D020407:Internet; D008297:Male; D008402:Mass Media; D024802:Nurse's Role / Q000523:psychology; D015404:Nursing Methodology Research; D009740:Nursing Staff / Q000193:education / Q000523:psychology*; D012449:Safety; D012648:Self Care / Q000379:methods / Q000523:psychology; D012737:Sex Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires