Skip to main content

Table 2 Additional illustrative quotes of participants

From: Informing the model of care for an academic integrative healthcare centre: a qualitative study exploring healthcare consumer perspectives

The integrative approach

 Perspectives on integrative healthcare

It’s all about taking control of yourself and your needs. I’ve set myself up pretty well and I choose which path to take. That’s how I work now. I am fortunate that I’ve got good practitioners within close range, but I know when I need to look for somebody else or another therapy and I sort of put the feelers out and decide. At the moment I have a great team with me and it all works together (P20).

 One-stop shop

I don’t have a chronic health condition, but I actually access complementary therapies as part of my health. The people I do use, including my doctor, are very receptive to me doing that. But when I go to my chiropractor, it’s like when are you getting the naturopath here? He’s like I can tell you who to go to, but she’s not there. That’s something that I’ve been looking for more now is that I want to be able to see my naturopath and my chiropractor at the same site (P8).

I suppose having everything in the one space instead of going to the doctor, this practitioner, that specialist; hydro here, physio there. Having everything that you need in the one space, even stuff you don’t need or you don’t think you need. I might think I don’t need Tai Chi, for example, but really the fact is I probably do to help me with my mental health or whatever or yoga for movement or whatever (P1).

Person-centred care

 Whole-person care

I went to my doctor about three weeks ago and he put me on anti-inflammatories, and I’m not supposed to take those because I had a stomach bleed about three years ago, and it’s just not helping, they don’t do anything. I did Pilates and yoga, and I’ve been pain free for the first time in I don’t know how many years with no ill effects (P21).

I had cancer when I was 27. I’m 52 now. But I just sort of went, no, I’m not going to go the doctor way, I’m just going to do it my own way, because what the doctors gave to me made me really sick. I just had to say well I can’t have that. So I’ve actively done acupuncture for 20 years outside my doctors - for 20-odd years now I’ve had to deal with even my psoriatic arthritis without painkillers, without having treatment and stuff like that (P9).

Yeah, you go as a rheumatoid arthritis patient, nobody mentioned diet to me. I paid a lot of money for my specialist trying to get good ones, and that was all done by me. Basically GPs only look at you if you’re on medication. There is no one out there that will support my choice to go medication free and work with diet, dah, dah, dah It just becomes stock-standard practice for me … sorry, I don’t have a good relationship with them (P20).

 Shared decision making

I’ve put a care team together for me. I have rheumatoid arthritis, so I have my care team, which changes. But if I have anybody come in that tells me you cannot cure rheumatoid arthritis, they get the flick before we go any further. I want them to work for me; they support me in what I’m doing. I have a circle that whoever I need to go to at that point in time will give me support. So then that’s what works on a whole like how are they going to work in with my integrative doctor, and work in with me, you know. It’s working with me because I know what my body needs … So it’s all about sharing the decision making and letting me do what I know best about my body (P20).

 Healing environment

The critical factor in terms of patient care is having that personal relationship; people you trust. If you have that with the clients that come through the door they will come back. They will get more engaged in their treatment. If there's a holistic approach, treating the whole person with the patient at the centre of the care model, people will keep coming back (P7).

Safety and quality

 Medical oversight

If the clinician is there overseeing they’re qualifying exactly what you prescribed … We have that assessment done, we actually isolate their condition. We say okay, what are your other needs? What are your limitations as a result of these injuries? How do we get you back moving and engaged? You share and bounce off each other (P2).

 Intake process

If you have pretty dynamic people on the frontline and they’ve got their list of questions to ask and you can do your ticks and crosses and things when they’re booking. Like the receptionist says can you tell me a bit about the problem? You can work out something there and which way they should go (P21).

 Practitioner competency

The other issue is practitioners who have been trained in China, so where the expertise in that comes from, so that the patients feel comfort that it was good training, that it was appropriate, that it is as valuable there as what is valued here. They have the same level of expertise. They are now practising here but they’ve gone through all of the hoops (P11).

I mean I’m really curious about acupuncture, but I think I’d like to know that they’ve had some training first. Like it’s not just some random person sticking needles into me (P18).