Complementary and alternative medicine use in diabetics accessing tertiary out: Patient care in Nigeria

Abstract

Complementary and alternative medicines are groups of medical and health care systems, practices and products that are not presently considered to be aspects of conventional medicine. The study aimed at finding the prevalence and factors related to complementary and alternative medicine use among diabetics in a tertiary out patient clinic. Ethical approval and individual consent were obtained before diabetics were purposively recruited with aquestionnaire which captured demographics, clinical characteristics and responses. Three hundred and one individuals made up of 165 (54.8%) males and 136 (45.2%) females with mean age 52.5±9.4 years were recruited. Most had HbA1c levels ≥8%. Hypertension was the commonest co-morbidity (68.2%). Majority (61.8%) used complementary and alternative medicine through the oral route and did not inform their diabetes care providers. The use of complementary and alternative treatment by individuals with Diabetes is common and significant.