Complementary and alternative medicine use among kidney transplant patients in Turkey; prevalence, clinical features and outcomes

Introduction: Our aim in this study to evaluate the prevalence, types of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) and outcomes among patients kidney transplant recipients in our country.Methods: This is a cross-sectional study was conducted from May 2019 to May 2020 in the nephrology outpatient clinics of five different university hospital. They answered a self-administered a survey questionnaire, this form is included questions on socio-demographic and clinical features and on the CAM therapies.Results: A total of 830 patients (496 [59.8%] males, 334 [40.2%] females; mean age 43.9 +/- 9.4 years) kidney transplantation recruited for the study. One hundred ninety-two (22.8%) of the patients reported the use of one or more forms of CAM. Meanwhile, 64.5% of CAM users did not report their CAM therapies to their physicians. There was a significant correlates for CAM users were older age (P = 0.00; odds ratio (OR) = 0.76; 95% CI = 0.88-0.93), occupational status (P = 0.045) and monthly income (P = 0.021; odds ratio (OR) = 2.18; 95% CI = 1.42-3.3).Conclusions: We determined that every five of one kidney transplant patients were using one type of CAM. Some of these CAMs are potentially harmful and may affect patient compliance to immunosuppressive therapies. Physicians should ask questions about CAM to patients on visit days and should explained their knowledge about CAM therapies.