Pharmacist's knowledge and attitudes towards complementary and alternative medicine in Saudi Arabia: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

Objective: Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is defined as a domain of diverse medical and healthcare systems, practices, and products that are not considered as a significant part of conventional medicine. The study has aimed to assess hospital and clinical pharmacist perceptions, experience, and knowledge toward CAM; and determined commonly used information resources to answer CAM-related inquiries. Methods: Saudi pharmacists completed a survey based on a previous rural Australian community pharmacist views on CAM. The study was a cross-sectional questionnaire developed by item generation through a review of scientific literature and focus groups. A total of 199 pharmacists completed the survey. Results: A total of 199 pharmacists completed the survey. 20% of the participants indicated that they have completed their post-graduation in CAM qualification. It has been evaluated that 53% of the participants did not believe in the safety of CAM, and about 60% of participants were confident in discussing CAM therapy with the patients. Internet was the common route, used by participants to search for information regarding CAM. The relationship between different demographic variables and the attitude score of the participants was statistically significant (P =.015). This is because pharmacists, who received postgraduate CAM qualification, had higher attitude score as compared to those, who did not receive post-graduate CAM qualification. There were also statistically significant differences (P =.008) amongst the pharmacists, who frequently, sometimes, occasionally, or never recommend complementary medicine to the patients. Conclusion: Pharmacists play an important role in ensuring that CAMs are used safely and appropriately in Saudi Arabia; therefore, they need to be better informed about CAMs and better able to advise patients, seeking alternative remedies.