The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #42165

Debbera Peoples-Lee, MS, Temple University Hospital, 3401 N. Broad Street, Rock Pavilion Basement - Room 102, Philadelphia, PA 19140, 215-707-7538, peopled@tuhs.temple.edu

Health care professionals must constantly expand their knowledge base to keep current with the ever-growing body of information on therapeutic substances and disease management. The scope of this information is determined by many factors, but trends in patient interest and demand are important driving forces. Among the many forces influencing the present multicultural health care environment is the increased interest in and use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies. Given this trend and the current focus on integrated, multidisciplinary, patient-centered care, it is important to understand health professionals' attitudes with respect to CAM education, and identify differences in the knowledge and attitudes among them. Previous studies in this area have assessed primarily physicians' and medical students' attitudes, and were conducted five or more years ago, before the widespread media attention focused on CAM. This study will offer new and current data for assessing and comparing the attitudes, perceptions, knowledge and use of CAM across multiple undergraduate health profession disciplines at Temple University. Specifically, it will evaluate both student and faculty perceived needs for and barriers to CAM education, determine their impact on the CAM curriculum development initiative, and predict their influence on the future implementation of CAM instruction at Temple University, where there is presently no formal CAM course offered. The attitudes of today's students become the attitudes of tomorrow's health care practitioners and emerging trends in the CAM field have implications for practitioner-patient relationships, educational initiatives on CAM, and future multidisciplinary health care delivery in the United States.

Learning Objectives:

• To identify the similiarities and differences between personal characteristics versus knowledge and use of CAM among students and faculty of various healthcare professions.
• To recognize and understand how the constructs of Everett Roger's Diffusion of Innovation Theory can be used as the theoretical framework for identifying the five adopter category roles students and faculty of various healthcare professions might embrace in a CAM education initiative.
• To evaluate if differences in attitude and perception of the inclusion of CAM instruction among students and faculty of various healthcare professions relate to the diffusion (adoption/rejection) of CAM curriculum development initiatives.

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.