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Hospitals Add Alternative Healthcare Choices
WebMD reported on July 20,
2006 that 25% of US Hospitals now offer what they called, "Complementary and
Alternative Medicine Therapies." This information comes from a new
survey of nearly 1400 US hospitals showing this trend. Researchers Sita
Ananth of Health Forum, an affiliate of the American Hospital Association,
and William Martin, PsyD, of the College of Commerce at DePaul University in
Chicago, commented, "More and more, patients are requesting care beyond what
most consider to be traditional health services, and hospitals are
responding to the needs of the communities they serve by offering these
therapies."
The
article defines Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) as including
acupuncture, chiropractic, homeopathy, diet and lifestyle changes, herbal
medicine, and massage therapy. However, many inside the chiropractic
profession claim chiropractic should not be classified as an "alternative
medicine" as it is a separate and unique health profession.
The American Hospital
Association conducts this survey every two years. These surveys have
shown a huge increase, noting that the percentage of hospitals offering one
or more CAM services have increased from 8% in 1998 to 27% in 2005.
This trend is most likely in response to consumer requests. In 2002 a
survey from the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, showed that more
than half of Americans thought combining non medical health care with
conventional medicine would be helpful.
The researchers found in this
most recent study that complimentary and alternative medicine offerings
were most common in the Midwest, and less common on the West Coast with the
South being the least common areas to offer CAM services in hospitals.
The study reported that teaching hospitals had the highest usage with 36%
offering these services. This may coincide with the fact that
according to a 2004 study more than 75% of medical schools now require a
course in CAM.
Interestingly enough,
although there is an increased trend toward offering these services, the
study noted that most of these CAM services are paid for by the patients
themselves as an out-of-pocket medical expense, and not covered by
insurance. |