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Table 3 Knowledge of, Experience with, Expectations about, and Willingness to Try Five CAM Therapies*

From: Complementary and alternative medical therapies for chronic low back pain: What treatments are patients willing to try?

 

Acupuncture

(N = 249)

Chiropractic

(N = 249)

Massage

(N = 249)

Meditation

(N = 249)

T'ai Chi

(N = 249)

Knowledge about Therapy (%)

     

   1 – 2 (1="no knowledge")

69

44

52

72

91

   3

17

22

24

15

6

   4 – 5 (5="a lot of knowledge")

14

34

24

13

3

Ever tried therapy (%)

18

54

38

27

8

Ever tried therapy for LBP (%)

11

45

24

7

0.4

Median helpfulness for LBP among prior users (0 to 10 scale)

5

6

7

5

**

Pain or harm reported by prior users (%)

13

23

13

5

16

Median expectation of helpfulness for current LBP (0 to 10 scale)

5

5

7

3

5

Did not provide expectation rating (%)

25

10

9

12

24

High expectations of helpfulness for current LBP (7 to 10 on 0 to 10 scale) (%)

19

28

48

15

16

Very likely to try therapy if primary care provider thought reasonable and no extra cost (%)

64

51

69

27

41

Very likely to try therapy if primary care provider thought reasonable and $10 co-pay (%)

51

42

56

NA

NA

  1. NA = Not Asked. * Each column refers to a specific therapy and the specific question about the therapy is shown in the first column. ** Only 1 person had tried t'ai chi for low back pain previously. All variables, except expectations of helpfulness of current LBP (where % are given in the table) have missing values for < 5% of respondents.