Many adults turn to CAM for chronic pain relief

About 38 percent adults and nearly 12 percent of children in the United States used some type of complementary or alternative medicine therapy in 2007, according to survey data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health.

Adults primarily reported using complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) to help manage chronic pain such as back, neck, or joint pain, as well as arthritis. Among children, the most common reason for using CAM was back or neck pain. However, children had a greater variety of conditions being treated with CAM than did adults, including head and chest colds, anxiety and stress, insomnia attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and musculosketal complaints.

“While both children and adults are using CAM at high rates, the types of therapies they use and the conditions for which they are using these therapies vary between children and adults,” the acting director of the division of extramural research at the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, part of the NIH, said at a press briefing.

The survey data come from the 2007 National Health Interview Survey and include information on the use of CAM from more than 23,000 adults and 9,400 children. Officials at CDC, which administers the survey, first collected data on CAM use in adults in 2002. This is the first time that information was collected about use by children.

The percentage of adults using CAM appears to be holding steady. The rate was about 36 percent in 2002 and about 38 percent in 2007. Adults are much more likely than children to use CAM, probably because adults have more health care needs.

Natural products, including herbal medicines and dietary supplements, were the most commonly used CAM therapies. For adults, some of the most common natural products were fish oil, glucosamine, Echinacea, flaxseed oil, or pills, and ginseng. Other popular CAM therapies used by adults were deep breathing exercises, chiropractic manipulation, massage, and yoga. For children, the most common natural product was Echinacea, followed by fish oil, combination herb pills, and flaxseed oil or pills. Other common CAM therapies used by children included chiropractic manipulation, deep breathing exercises, yoga, and homeopathic treatment.