An analysis of predictors of conventional and complementary healthcare use in Yorkshire

Background

Well-recognised trends in types of services used by patients exist within health service utilisation. One increasing area is complementary and alternative medicine (CAM); considered distinct from the use of health professionals working in conventional medicine. Little is known about the contribution of CAM and whether people using CAM with multiple comorbidities make correspondingly less use of conventional health services.

Aims

1) To describe self-reported visits to conventional health professionals and CAM practitioners, and to identify predictors of such visits; 2) To quantify the effect of demographic, health-related and CAM service take-up factors on contact with health services delivered by conventional health professionals.

Methods

Data from 70,836 participants in the Yorkshire Health Study, a large-scale population-based cohort study, was analysed descriptively and inferentially to test for associations between variables.

Results

3.5 % of the cohort reported accessing CAM services in the previous three months. Level of contact with conventional health professionals was higher in those accessing practitioner-led CAM services (incidence rate ratio [IRR]=1.28; p < 0.001.) Female gender, older age and increased incidence of mental and physical health conditions were also positively associated with the outcome.

Conclusions

Self-reported utilisation of CAM services was low but there were several predictors of recent CAM use based on demographic and health conditions which may be of help in understanding conventional and CAM healthcare utilisation.