Alternative Cancer Treatments - People Who Choose Alternative Treatments

People Who Choose Alternative Treatments

People who choose alternative treatments tend to believe that evidence-based medicine is ineffective, while still believing that their own health could be improved. They are impressed by physiological and other scientific-sounding information, prefer a healthcare model that treats the patient as an integrated, whole person, and are loyal to their alternative healthcare providers.

Cancer patients who choose complementary or alternative treatments in addition to conventional treatments believe themselves less likely to die than patients who choose only conventional treatments. They feel a greater sense of control over their destinies, and report less anxiety and depression.

However, patients who use alternative treatments have a poorer survival time, even after controlling for type and stage of disease. The reason that patients using alternative treatments die sooner may be because patients who accurately perceive that they are likely to survive do not attempt unproven remedies, and patients who accurately perceive that they are unlikely to survive are attracted to unproven remedies. Among patients who believe their condition to be untreatable by evidence-based medicine, "desperation drives them into the hands of anyone with a promise and a smile." Con artists have long exploited fear, ignorance, and desperation to strip dying people of their money, comfort, and dignity.

About half the practitioners who dispense complementary or alternative treatments are physicians, although they tend to be generalists rather than oncologists. As many as 60% of physicians have referred their patients to a complementary or alternative practitioner for some purpose.