Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Jan 29:16:37.
doi: 10.1186/s12906-016-1017-0.

Complementary alternative medicine use among patients with dengue fever in the hospital setting: a cross-sectional study in Malaysia

SiewMooi Ching  1   2 , Vasudevan Ramachandran  3 , Lai Teck Gew  4 , Sazlyna Mohd Sazlly Lim  5 , Wan Aliaa Wan Sulaiman  5 , Yoke Loong Foo  5 , Zainul Amiruddin Zakaria  6 , Nurul Huda Samsudin  5 , Paul Chih Ming Chih Lau  5 , Sajesh K Veettil  7 , Fankee Hoo  5
Affiliations

Complementary alternative medicine use among patients with dengue fever in the hospital setting: a cross-sectional study in Malaysia

SiewMooi Ching et al. BMC Complement Altern Med. .

Abstract

Background: In Malaysia, the number of reported cases of dengue fever demonstrates an increasing trend. Since dengue fever has no vaccine or antiviral treatment available, it has become a burden. Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has become one of the good alternatives to treat the patients with dengue fever. There is limited study on the use of CAM among patients with dengue fever, particularly in hospital settings. This study aims to determine the prevalence, types, reasons, expenditure, and resource of information on CAM use among patients with dengue fever.

Methods: This is a descriptive, cross-sectional study of 306 patients with dengue fever, which was carried out at the dengue clinic of three hospitals. Data were analysed using IBM SPSS Statistics version 21.0 and logistic regression analysis was used to determine the factors associated with CAM use.

Results: The prevalence of CAM use was 85.3% among patients with dengue fever. The most popular CAMs were isotonic drinks (85.8%), crab soup (46.7%) and papaya leaf extract (22.2%). The most common reason for CAM use was a good impression of CAM from other CAM users (33.3%). The main resource of information on CAM use among patients with dengue fever was family (54.8%). In multiple logistic regression analysis, dengue fever patients with a tertiary level are more likely to use CAM 5.8 (95% confidence interval (CI 1.62-20.45) and 3.8 (95% CI 1.12-12.93) times than secondary level and primary and below respectively.

Conclusion: CAM was commonly used by patients with dengue fever. The predictor of CAM use was a higher level of education.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. What is Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM)? https://nccih.nih.gov/ webcite last accessed 15 September 2014.
    1. WHO. Traditional medicine growing needs and potential–WHO policy perspectives on medicines, No. 002, May 2002 http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Js2293e/ last accessed 28 March 2015. Archieved at :https://nccih.nih.gov/research/statistics/NHIS/2012
    1. Barnes PM, Bloom B, Nahin RL. Complementary and alternative medicine use among adults and children: United States. Natl Health Stat Report. 2007;2008(12):1–23. - PubMed
    1. Chang HY, Wallis M, Tiralongo E, Wang HL. Decision-making related to complementary and alternative medicine use by people with Type 2 diabetes: a qualitative study. J Clin Nurs. 2012;21(21–22):3205–15. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2702.2012.04339.x. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Ministry of Health Malaysia . CPG :management of dengue infection in adults. 2 2010.

Publication types