title: What do general practitioners think about acupuncture?
abstract: The goal of the study was to observe the opinion of the GPs of one of the two Turin Local Health Unit (from now on LHU) and compare them to what emerges from literature. We employed a questionnaire administered via phone to all the 389 GPs active in the LHU in October 2013. The percentage of responders was 81.5%. Among the responders, 95% are in favor of acupuncture, 84.2% believe that it is scientifically based, 6% practice acupuncture, 25.2% use it on themselves, and 66.2% have sent at least one patient to an acupuncturist in the last year. 82% of responders are in favour of adding acupuncture training to their own professional practice, and 71.9% believe it would be useful to include acupuncture in specific training for general practice. 64% believe that acupuncture should be included into the benefits offered by the NHS. Data show that interest for acupuncture is higher than that observed in previous international studies carried out on the same topics in the last 20 years; in our opinion, such an increase in confidence and trust in acupuncture is due to the skilled performance offered by the public service in this LHU, which is also guaranteed by a prestigious acupuncture school.
authors.affiliation: Medical managers of Territorial Health Service of Local Health Unit TO 1 in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fanì
authors.affiliation: Medical managers of Territorial Health Service of Local Health Unit TO 1 in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Maestro
authors.affiliation: Medical managers of Territorial Health Service of Local Health Unit TO 1 in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mandas
authors.affiliation: Medical managers of Territorial Health Service of Local Health Unit TO 1 in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Orecchia
authors.affiliation: Specialist Registrar in Hygiene and Preventive Medicine, Department of Public Health and Pediatrics, University of Turin, Italy.
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Le Gouëllec
authors.affiliation: Lecturer in Acupuncture and Complementary Techniques at the Physical and Natural Therapies Research Centre, Turin, Italy.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pedrali
mesh_terms: D015670:Acupuncture Therapy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D005260:Female; D058006:General Practice / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D058005:General Practitioners / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009313:National Health Programs; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires