Investigation into Complementary and Integrative Health Approaches for Turkish Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer

• Published in: Journal of religion and health Vol. 57; no. 4; pp. 1497 - 1508
• Main Authors: Pehlivan, Seda, Süner, Ali, Yıldırım, Yasemin, Fadıloğlu, Çiçek
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer 01.08.2018; Springer US; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; Aging; Alternative medicine; Cancer therapies; Clinical Psychology; Colorectal Neoplasms - ethnology; Colorectal Neoplasms - therapy; Complementary Therapies - methods; Cross-Sectional Studies; Diagnostic tests; Female; Gastric cancer; Gastrointestinal cancer; Gastrointestinal diseases; Holistic medicine; Humans; Integrative Medicine; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Original Paper; Public Health; Religious Studies; Surveys and Questionnaires; Gastrointestinal cancer; Complementary and integrative health approaches; Symptoms; Nurse
• ISSN: 0022-4197; 1573-6571
• DOI: 10.1007/s10943-017-0546-2

The study was conducted to determine the levels of usage of complementary and integrative health (CIH) approaches and the symptoms experienced by Turkish patients with gastrointestinal cancer. A descriptive study was conducted on 81 patients with gastrointestinal cancer attending the medical oncology department of an oncology hospital. In the data collection stage, the patient description form that prepared by the researchers and the "Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale" were used. Data were evaluated via Chisquare and student t test. It was determined that 55.6% of the patients with gastrointestinal cancer applied at least one CIH approaches, and these CIH approaches were praying (80.0%), herbal medicine (57.7%), a special diet (40.0%), therapeutic touch (15.6%), exercise (13.3%) and psychotherapy (4.4%). 68.8% of patients who used the CIH approach stated that they applied the CIH approaches in order to supplement the medical treatment, and 91.1% stated that they did not inform health employees about that they using the CIH approach. It was also found that the use of CIH approaches was not related to sociodemographic characteristics, disease characteristics and experienced symptoms. It is very important that patients with gastrointestinal cancer be questioned in terms of CIH approaches used.