Abstract

BRESCIA, Susana M.. Actitud y opinión de los pediatras ante las medicinas alternativas. Arch. argent. pediatr. [online]. 2004, vol.102, n.2, pp.88-95. ISSN 0325-0075.

Introduction. There are no studies about alternative medicine in Argentine medical publications, but Medline System offers many studies in the English literature. The purpose of this work was to obtain information about local reality to make the subject objective, leaving off suppositions through the assessment of hospital doctors and general practitioners attitudes towards the alternative medicines homeopathy, acupuncture and flower therapy and to compare them with similar results shown by the English bibliography. Population and methods. The survey included 190 physicians of the Hospital de Niños Pedro de Elizalde, of Buenos Aires. An anonymous questionnaire was administered to a stratified sample. Results. 13.2% had been subjected to some AM. 10.7% of hospital doctors had referred patients; 1.6% had studied them formally; 52.1% expressed interest in receiving information. If a patient was treated with homeopathy or flower remedies, 62.2% allowed to continue with these therapies and 37.8% discontinued them. Had a favourable opinion about homeopathy 24.2%, about acupuncture and flower therapy, 36.8% and 5.3%, respectively. 47.9%, 50%, and 73.7%, respectively, reported ignorance about homeopathy, acupuncture and flower therapy. 40.0% thought that this AM should be taught in Faculties of Medicine. Pediatricians and those who had received therapies with AM showed higher levels of favourable values. The difference for these were statistically significant. Conclusions. Personal therapy with AM predisposes physicians to have favourable attitudes towards alternative medicines. The principal negative influence was ignorance. Similar variables in the English bibliography showed higher favourable values than those found in this study.

Keywords : Alternative medicine; Physicians; Attitude; Opinion.

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