Alternative Medicine

Study: Alternative Med Use Also Popular Among Kids


NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - While it is known that many adults treat their own illnesses with herbal medicine, prayer and other complementary and alternative therapies, new study findings show that many of them also use these remedies for their children.

The findings are based on random nationwide telephone surveys of 1,501 mothers, fathers and other primary caregivers of children and adolescents. Dr. Michael B. Aldous of the University of Arizona in Tucson and colleagues conducted the survey and analyzed the results.

Nearly one quarter (22%) of the parents used some type of alternative medicine for their child, and almost one in 10 allowed their child to visit a complementary and alternative medicine provider, such as a chiropractor, osteopathic physician or homeopath, study findings indicate.

Further, more than 80% of the parents were somewhat or very satisfied with their child's most recent use of complementary and alternative medicines and 86% of parents considered the therapies to be somewhat or very helpful.

Finally, 90% said they would be willing to use complementary and alternative medicines for their children in the future.

Only two-thirds of the parents, however, informed their child's physician about complementary and alternative medicine use.

Numerous studies have indicated that some alternative medicines may interact with prescription drugs, making it important for a person's doctor to know what types of alternative medicine he or she may be taking.

In fact, many researchers agree that more studies are needed to determine the health risks of various nontraditional therapies, to make sure that those risks do not outweigh their benefits.

Overall, the most common alternative medicines--used by 8% of the children and adolescents in the study--were vitamins other than multivitamins. Other popular therapies were herbal remedies, spiritual healing or prayer and various chiropractic therapies.

Use of these complementary and alternative medicines was twice as common among children with chronic illness than among their healthy peers. These therapies were most often used to treat respiratory illnesses other than asthma, strains and sprains, allergies, digestive problems and ear infections.

Twelve percent of the children also used alternative medicines as a method of disease prevention.

The findings were presented last week at the American Academy of Pediatrics' annual meeting in Boston.