Woo attitudes and use at University of California, Irvine

This paper from a few months ago in BMC Medical Education looked at attitudes toward and use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) at UCI. Students, faculty and house staff were surveyed. The survey is difficult to interpret because the faculty members selected for survey were only those who taught or were planning to teach CAM. There were some interesting tidbits, nevertheless.

Figure 2 summarizes the results and indicates significant rates of use of homeopathy, therapeutic touch and Curanderismo (folk healing) by faculty.

Perhaps more interesting than the paper itself is this survey (also from UCI) which it cited, showing that medical student use of CAM modalities exceeded rates of CAM use in the general population! Students’ use of CAM didn’t decrease over time. The list of modalities used included vitamins, meditation, massage, herbals, chiropractic, traditional Oriental, T'ai Chi, homeopathy, Ayurveda, therapeutic touch and Curanderismo.