Lagunju I A
Department of Paediatrics, College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria.
Afr J Med Med Sci. 2013 Mar;42(1):15-23.
There is documented evidence that the use of complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) has been on the increase worldwide.
A standardized questionnaire was administered to caregivers of children with epilepsy to evaluate the prevalence and pattern of CAM use.
One hundred and seventy five caregivers of 175 children with epilepsy were studied. Ninety nine (56.6%) of the caregivers gave a history of CAM use. The forms of CAM used were herbal preparations (39.4%), spiritual/prayer healing (34.3%), scarifications (17.1%) and special vitamins (6.1%). Seventy (40%) of the 175 children had received CAM ever before seeking Western Medicine for the treatment of epilepsy. Of the 99 children with history of CAM use, 33 (33.3%) continued to use CAM in combination with the prescribed anti-epileptic drug (AED). Adverse effects were reported in 17 (17.1%) cases. There was no statistically significant relationship between the type of epilepsy and the use of CAM (p= 0.229, OR 1.655, 95% CI 0.608-4.508). There was a statistically significant inverse relationship between social class of the family (p = 0.043, OR 0.354, 95% CI 1.087-2.489) and mother's level of education (p = 0.013, OR 2.618, 95% CI 1.173-5.844) and the use of CAM. Only 30 (30.3%) of the 99 caregivers had spontaneously volunteered the history of the use of CAM to the attending physician and the leading reason for not giving the history was that the attending physician did not ask for the information.
Children with epilepsy frequently use CAM and attending physicians often fail to ask about use of CAM in the routine evaluation of patients. There is a need to routinely ask caregivers and patients about the use of CAM in management of their disease.
有文献记载，全球范围内补充和替代医学（CAM）的使用呈上升趋势。
对癫痫患儿的照料者进行标准化问卷调查，以评估CAM的使用 prevalence 和模式。
对175名癫痫患儿的175名照料者进行了研究。99名（56.6%）照料者有使用CAM的病史。使用的CAM形式有草药制剂（39.4%）、精神/祈祷疗法（34.3%）、划痕法（17.1%）和特殊维生素（6.1%）。175名患儿中有70名（40%）在寻求西医治疗癫痫之前曾接受过CAM治疗。在有CAM使用史的99名患儿中，33名（33.3%）继续将CAM与 prescribed 抗癫痫药物（AED）联合使用。报告有不良反应的有17例（17.1%）。癫痫类型与CAM的使用之间无统计学显著关系（p = 0.229，OR 1.655，95% CI 0.608 - 4.508）。家庭社会阶层（p = 0.043，OR 0.354，95% CI 1.087 - 2.489）和母亲的教育程度（p = 0.013，OR 2.618，95% CI 1.173 - 5.844）与CAM的使用之间存在统计学显著的负相关关系。99名照料者中只有30名（30.3%）自发地向主治医生提供了CAM使用史，未提供病史的主要原因是主治医生未询问该信息。
癫痫患儿经常使用CAM，而主治医生在对患者的常规评估中往往未询问CAM的使用情况。有必要在疾病管理中常规询问照料者和患者关于CAM的使用情况。
