CAM use among mid-age women: a national mixed-methods study across the urban-rural divide

该项目的目的是了解和解释为什么在澳大利亚各地区中年妇女使用补充和替代医学的比例高于城市地区。这些工作将为关于这一主题的政策和实践提供证据基础，项目的调查结果将有助于制定社区和农业保健倡议和方案，这些倡议和方案对社区保健、保健实践和提供方面的地理差异敏感。妇女比男性更有可能使用CAM治疗，中年妇女被发现是澳大利亚妇女中CAM使用者最多的群体。研究人员和从业人员已经确定CAM内的治疗方法可能非常适合处理中年妇女中普遍存在的一系列健康问题和相关症状，包括癌症，关节炎，糖尿病和哮喘以及更年期的发作。我们之前的试点工作发现，区域地区的中年妇女使用CAM的可能性明显高于城市地区。关于为什么会这样，可以或已经提出了一些解释。其中包括：区域内获得常规保健服务的机会有限;非城市全科医生与补充和辅助医疗服务提供者之间的工作联系更加密切;对区域内的常规保健服务不满意;非城市地区的非正式社区网络更加强大。我们提出的项目将利用全国中年妇女的代表性样本来检验这些假设，并将为决策者、从业人员、消费者和所有参与澳大利亚城市和区域妇女健康和保健的人提供有益和感兴趣的结果。

The aim of this project is to understand and explain why higher proportions of mid-age women in regional areas use complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) than those in urban areas of Australia. Such work will provide an evidence-base for policy and practice on this topic and the project findings will help develop CAM initiatives and programs for women’s health that are sensitive to geographical variations in community health, health practice and provision. Women are significantly more likely to utilise CAM treatments than males and mid-age women have been found to be the highest CAM user group amongst Australian women. Researchers and practitioners have identified treatments from within CAM as potentially well-suited to dealing with a range of health problems and associated symptoms prevalent amongst mid-age women including the onset of cancer, arthritis, diabetes and asthma as well as menopause. Our previous pilot work found that mid-age women in regional areas are significantly more likely to use CAM than those in urban areas. A number of explanations as to why this is so can be or have been proposed. These include: limited access to conventional health care services in regional areas; closer working ties between non-urban general practitioners and CAM provision; dissatisfaction with conventional health care services in regional areas and stronger informal community networks in nonurban areas. Our proposed project, drawing upon a national representative sample of mid-age women will test such hypotheses and will provide findings of benefit and interest to policy makers, practitioners, consumers and all involved in women’s health and health care across urban and regional Australia.