ArticleBMC complementary medicine and therapies2023
Cancer patients' behaviors and attitudes toward natural health products.
Article in BMC complementary medicine and therapies, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT07745205 (HEALTHS - Holistic Evaluation of Approaches to Long-term Health and Survivorship), which is not on this map. Cited by 6 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
HEALTHS - Holistic Evaluation of Approaches to Long-term Health and Survivorship (Focus Phytotherapy) A Single-center, Minimal-risk, Two-phase Study Including a Quantitative Observational Survey and an Interventional Mixed-methods Component With Focus Group Sessions.
Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.
- Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Oncology: A Concise Review of Utilization, Evidence, and Integration Challenges.Cancer reports (Hoboken, N.J.) · 2026Review
- Comparing the Attitudes of Healthcare Professionals and Cancer Patients Toward the Integration and Perceived Effectiveness of Complementary and Alternative Medicine.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Comparing Perspectives on Traditional and Complementary Medicine Use in Oncology: Insights from Healthcare Professionals and Oncology Patients in Western Mexico.Current oncology (Toronto, Ont.) · 2025Article
- Bridging the gap: attitudes and practices toward complementary and alternative medicine among oncology patients and healthcare professionals in Croatia.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Cancer Patients' Behavior and Perception on the Use of Medical Foods and Dietary Supplements During Chemotherapy.Patient preference and adherence · 2025Article
- Natural Health Products for Anti-Cancer Treatment: Evidence and Controversy.Journal of personalized medicine · 2024Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundNatural health products (NHPs), including vitamins, minerals, and herbal supplements, are the most common complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) among cancer patients. Our survey determined the attitudes and behaviors of cancer patients toward natural complementary therapies that should be considered to implement an integrative approach in the future.
methodsOur survey was conducted in four hospitals in Belgium. Questionnaires were posted online from October 2020 to October 2021 for cancer patients. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. A [Formula: see text] test was applied to study the type of NHP consumed according to diagnosis time. Fischer's exact test compared patients who had changed their consumption since diagnosis and those who had not.
resultsOut of 349 questionnaires collected, only 59 met all inclusion criteria. 83.1 % of the patients agreed that conventional medicine (CM) could benefit from complementary therapies, but they did not estimate (72.3 % of the patients) that those latter are more effective than conventional medicine. More than half of the patients used five or more NHPs. The most frequent NHPs consumed daily were vitamins (64.4 %), followed by other products (i.e., probiotics, gemmotherapy, birch sap and omega 3/6) (42.4 %) and herbs (40.7 %). Almost all patients started taking NHPs before their cancer diagnosis, but 72.7 % have changed their consumption significantly (p = 0.009) since their diagnosis. Boosting the immune system (79.7 %) and limiting conventional treatment side effects (76.9 %) were the most common reasons for NHPs' use. 74.4 % of the patients did not take complementary therapies to delay or avoid conventional treatment.
conclusionsThe combination and high diversity of NHPs consumption highlight the importance of educating patients and healthcare providers (HCPs) about the risk of drug interactions associated with these natural products. Most cancer patients are more interested in using this non-mainstream medicine to complement their conventional treatment than as an alternative. Knowing the patients' reasons and understanding patients' attitudes toward NHPs will be essential for HCPs to address NHPs' use.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.