The use and knowledge of Traditional and Complementary Medicine (T/CM) among students of UiTM Pulau Pinang for health maintenance

Introduction: Ministry of Health, Malaysia 2007, Traditional and Complementary Medicine (T/CM) is defines as a form of health-related practices designed to prevent, treat and / or manage illnesses and / or preserve the mental and physical well-being of individuals. Frequently used terms of T/CM are Complementary Medicine, Alternative Medicine, Integrative Medicine, Natural Medicine and Holistic Medicine. Objective: The survey was conducted to explore use and knowledge towards among students at Universiti Teknologi Mara, Pulau Pinang. Methods: A self-completed questionnaire was distributed on 358 students over 5 months period (from July 2014 to November 2014) at UiTM Pulau Pinang. These students are from various faculty consist of Pharmacy, Health Sciences, Hotel Management and Tourism, Civil Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, and Pra-diploma. The purpose of the survey is to determine the use and knowledge of Traditional and Complementary Medicine (T/CM). Both descriptive and inferential statistics were applied using SPSS version 17. Results: Students who took part in our surveyed claimed that they were using T/CM therapies (70.1%). In the other hand, 29.9% of the respondents were not used T/CM therapies. The range of age is from 21.5 years (18-25 years). The used of Traditional Malay Medicine and Islamic Medicine Practice as the major therapy among UiTM students were 204 (56.9%) and 169 (47.2%) respectively. Most of the participants have family members using T/CM that was 206 (57.5%).Majority of students indicated their reason to use T/CM therapies was natural and savel45 (40.5%), it is followed by 75 (20.9%) of students’ reason for uses T/CM therapies because they believed their minor disease do not deserve visit to the physician. Most of the participants either have heard of, or know something of, the T/CM therapies. More than half participants only heard of Traditional Chinese Medicine, male (56.58%) female (55.26%) and Complementary Medicine, male (53.95%) female (51.35%). Higher number of male students who were choose that they know something on Traditional Malay Medicine and Islamic Medicine Practice therapies that are (47.37%) and (53.63%) respectively. Most of the female students never heard about Traditional India Medicine (52.7%) and Homeopathy Medicine (44.59%).Conclusions: Most of students of Universiti Teknologi MARA Pulau Pinang use T/CM and so their family members. Majority of students in UiTM Pulau Pinang who used CAM suggested to other people to use these therapies. Besides that, studies found that students should be well educated about Complementary Alternative Medicine (CAM) therapies.