The knowledge and attitudes towards recent regulations on complementary and alternative medicine among students and faculty members in Bezmialem University School of Medicine (BVUSOM)

Abstract

Turkish government published a 'Regulation on Traditional and Complementary Medical Therapies’ (CAM) in 2014. We aimed at assessing the knowledge and the thoughts of medical students and faculty members of BVUSOM on this regulation of Ministry of Health. All the students and faculty members were included in the research (in 2017-2018 academic year). Five hundred thirteen medical faculty students (68.8% of all students) and 90 teaching faculty members (57.7% of the all faculty members) participated to the study. One hundred and forty-eight (28.8%) of the students and 57 (63.3%) of faculty members reported that they know the legal regulation. At least one of the treatment methods suggested in the regulation was applied by 83 (16.2%) of the students. Four hundred (77.9%) of the students and 61 (67.8%) of the faculty members would like to be educated well enough so that they could treat their patients in any area of CAM. Medical students were more likely to show interest in receiving a training in CAM techniques than faculty members (p=0.03).

As CAM is still very new area of interest in Turkey. There are several strategies to integrate it to current medical education, including: embedding lectures, organizing multidisciplinary meetings, scheduling elective rotations and informing faculty members.