FRIDAY, April 12, 2002 (HealthDayNews) -- More Americans, particularly those suffering from arthritis and chronic pain disorders, are turning to alternative medicine to beat what ails them. By some estimates, visits to such practitioners may even exceed visits to conventional doctors.
Given that, how do traditional physicians view the flurry of non-conventional medicine?
According to new research, many doctors not only are aware of and seem to accept alternative strategies, they even engage in some of these practices themselves.
University of Maryland researchers set out to determine how often rheumatologists, the doctors who treat arthritis and related conditions, use alternative therapies -- either directly themselves or indirectly by referring a patient to another practitioner.
Several studies have shown people who see rheumatologists also use alternative medical treatments, says Barker Bausell, study co-author and the director of research at the University of Maryland Complementary Medicine Program in Baltimore.
"That's why we were interested in seeing the issue from the other side," Bausell says.
Bausell and his colleagues sent questionnaires about 22 different alternative therapies to 2,000 physicians who were members of the American Academy of Rheumatology. They got 924 responses back, analyzed the results and reported their findings in the current issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.
The alternative therapies listed in the survey were acupuncture; behavioral medicine; biofeedback; chiropractic; counseling/psychotherapy; dietary prescription; electromagnetic application (TENS and PENS); energetic healing; exercise intervention; herbal/botanical medicine; homeopathy; hypnotherapy; magnets; manipulation therapy (non-chiropractic); massage/manual healing; meditation; movement (yoga, qi gong); music/sound; nutraceuticals (glucasimon, S-adenosylmethionine); prayer and spiritual direction; relaxation techniques; and trigger-point therapy.
At least half of the doctors who responded had actually referred patients to eight of the therapies: acupuncture, behavioral medicine, biofeedback, counseling/psychotherapy, dietary prescriptions, electromagnetic application, exercise and massage.
More than half had either referred or directly used nine of the 22 therapies, with counseling/psychotherapy (85 percent) and exercise (81 percent) receiving the most responses.
Overall, the physicians surveyed were more likely to have referred a patient than to have administered the treatment themselves, with the exception of trigger-point therapy and nutraceuticals. In these cases, 51 percent and 34 percent of doctors, respectively, said they had used the therapy.
After that, the physicians were most likely to have directly been involved in exercise intervention (41 percent); dietary prescription (33 percent); counseling/psychotherapy (24 percent); and electromagnetic applications (10 percent).
The results seem to indicate an openness on the part of rheumatologists to alternative therapies, the study concludes.
Experts agree.
"This is an important study," says Dr. John Klippel, medical director of the Arthritis Foundation. "What it reflects is an emerging trend, which has probably been going on for the last 10 years, of rheumatologists becoming involved in complementary and alternative medical therapies."
"I think this has been driven by a couple of things, first and foremost by an interest by people with arthritis in using them," he adds.
"The second thing is that there's a growing body of evidence that [alternative medicine] can play an important role in the comprehensive treatment of someone with arthritis. Studies have appeared in journals that rheumatologists read," he notes.
Klippel adds, however, that "nearly 70 percent of physicians don't discuss alternative therapies with their patients because they do not feel knowledgeable enough."
The study did not focus on the effectiveness of the different alternative therapies. That is an entirely different question, and one which researchers are actively investigating. Currently, there is a large trial underway to see how effective acupuncture is against osteoarthritis.
"That, of course, is a big, big job," Bausell says.
What To Do
You can go to the Arthritis Foundation for more guidance on arthritis and alternative therapies and a free guide on supplements.
Visit the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine to see different fact sheets on alternative medicine.
