Publication: PATIENTS PERCEPTION TOWARDS ACUPUNCTURE AS A COMPLEMENTARY TREATMENT ON PAIN IN THE EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT (ED), SULTAN ISMAIL HOSPITAL
Date
2023-02-09
Authors
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Journal ISSN
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Publisher
International Medical University
Abstract
The objective of this study is to investigate the perception of the patients in Emergency Department (ED), Sultan Ismail Hospital (HSI) towards the acupuncture as a complementary treatment on pain.
Methodology
The study design was prospective cohort study design. Responses of participants were collected through a validated questionnaire. Results obtained were analyzed using R Studio software. A p-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results
Total 191 participants, 52.88% (n=101) of the participants were male, while 47.12% (n=90) were female. All the participants were adult those above 21 years old. 94.76% (n=181) were Malaysians and 5.24% (n=10, China) were foreigners. Majority of the participants’ race were Malay (n=91, 47.64%), follow by Chinese (n=50, 26.18%), Indian (n= 40, 20.94%) and others (n=10, 5.24%). For the occupation, participants who had professional background were 27.75% (n=53), employee were 49.74% (n=95) and businesspeople were 22.51% (n=43). Most of the participants were from the non-communicable diseases (n=163, 85.34%) and the rest were from communicable diseases (n=28, 14.66%). Only a few participants experienced acupuncture before (n=13, 6.81%), most of them only knew about acupuncture treatment (n=155, 81.15%) or never heard about acupuncture treatment before (n=23, 12.04%). The participants never realized that there were having traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) centre in HSI (n=133, 69.63%) and only 30.37% (n=58) noticed that the TCM centre is available in Sultan Ismail Hospital. Overall, the participants (patients) exhibited neutral (n=122, 63.87%) and agree (n=69, 36.13%) with the pain medicine treatment in emergency. Majority of them were also standing neutral (n=155, 81.15%) with the of Western pain medicine being applied in emergency. The patients also agreed the result of acute pain treatment was good (n=118, 61.78%). Overall, a high degree acceptance of complementary treatment in ED in HSI (n= 133, 69.63%) with no contra. The participants agreed they would be exposed to the risk being addicted if only depended on western medicine in pain treatment (n=113, 59.16%). They were agreeing that the acupuncture treatment had been globally proven (n=121, 63.35%), efficacious (n=134, 70.16%) and safe (n=129, 67.54%) as most of the participants only heard and never tried this treatment before (n=121, 63.35%). The participants also strongly agreed or showed high willingness to try acupuncture treatment if the opportunity was being provided (n=146, 76.44%). The patients agreed when answering the question regarding to the advantages of received acupuncture treatment (n=95, 49.74%). The vast majority of the participants strongly agreed that the acupuncture as a complementary treatment would reduce the side effect of the western medicine as well (n=157, 82.20%).
Conclusion
Through the study conducted, it can be concluded that the patients in ED HSI, Johor Bahru Malaysia were highly accepted the use of acupuncture as complementary treatment to treat pain. Hence, the acupuncture as complementary treatment for pain in emergency department should be widely popularized not only in in ED, HSI. This treatment is also strongly suggested to be listed as an essential complementary pain treatment in ED around Malaysia in order to improve the quality of service.
Keywords
Patient Perception, Acupuncture, Complementary Treatment, Pain, Emergency department.
Description
Keywords
Patients, Emergency Service, Hospital, Acupuncture, Perception, Complementary Therapies, Pain