Summary of Survey on Childhood Cancer Patients Receiving Non-western Medicine

Dr. Shing Ming Kong
Department of Paediatrics, CUHK

Thanks to the advance in modern medicine, about 70 to 80 per cent of child cancer patients can be cured. However, parents are still not satisfied with this rate of recovery and some of them have kept searching for alternative ways of treatment in the hope of finding the magic cure.

In addition to western medical treatments (including chemotherapy, surgery and radiotherapy), some parents may also consider non-western medicine (alternative or complementary medicine), such as traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), which is most popular alternative in Hong Kong.

There are some external factors that might persuade parents to TCM. These factors include:
1. TCM has a long history of over thousands of years
2. TCM is popular in the community
3. It is easy to locate a TCM practitioner or clinic
4. Many advertisements for TCM can be found in the media
5. Relatives and friends persuade them and give them information about TCM

This is what I tell parents who ask me about TCM:

1. There's no clinical evidence proving that TCM helps cure childhood cancer. When trying TCM treatments, do not stop the therapy prescribed by the doctors and receive only TCM treatments.
2. TCM can, at most, considered as a complementary treatment, which should be avoided while the patients are undergoing chemotherapy.

We conducted a comprehensive survey at the child cancer outpatients sections of the Prince of Wales Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Princess Margaret Hospital, to find out why people decided to try and the percentage of people who did so. Results were as follows:

A total of 492 child patients and their parents were interviewed. 62.4%, or 307, of the respondents, said they had never sought any non-western medical treatment, while 37.6%, or 185 respondents, said they had. The results showed a difference of 24.8 percentage points.

The majority of respondents who said they received other treatments had tried Chinese herbal medicines, prescriptions made by TCM practitioners, or over-the counter Chinese drugs (See figure 1). They cited the following reasons:

1. To strengthen the body immunity of the child patients
2. To reduce the side effects of chemotherapy or radiotherapy
3. Recommendations from friends and relatives
4. To try anything and everything that could be of help
5. Others (see figure 2)

Major reasons for not trying non-western medicine (TCM):
1. Unfamiliar with TCM
2. Worried that receiving other medications will affect the results of the current treatment
3. More confident about western medicine
4. There is no proof that TCM treatments are effective
5. Others (see figure 3)

On average, those who took non-western medicine spent $38,372 on Chinese medicine. The maximum amount paid was $280,800. Of the TCM users, 31.4% said the TCM was safe to use, while 17.3% said it was not safe or they simply didn't know. 11.1% of those who did not take up TCM said TCM was safe, while 27.7% said it was not safe (see figure 4).

Only 5.4% of respondents who received TCM said it was effective in curing their children's illness. Almost half, or 49.7%, of the parents, said they were not sure about the effectiveness of the TCM. About 29.7% said they did not notice any effect, while 15.1% said TCM was of no help at all (see figure 5).

Among the 185 TCM users, five, or 2.7%, said they used TCM exclusively, while most of the TCM users interviewed (180 respondents, or 97.3%) said they used both western and TCM treatments at the same time.

As a conclusion of the above survey, majority of the 492 respondents in the survey said they did not seek alternative treatments after the child was diagnosed with cancer, indicating a larger number of parents of child patients have great confidence in western medicine.

The Prince of Wales Hospital is conducting a research, "Clinical research of traditional Chinese medicine on childhood cancer", jointly with the two hospitals mentioned earlier to find out the medical evidence on the effectiveness of TCM in treating cancers. We hope that we could share the clinical statistics and the results with the public in the near future.

Acknowledgement：The Children's Cancer Foundation Peter Nash Paediatric Oncology Research Grant for sponsoring the research