Levels of Commitment: Exploring Complementary Therapy Use by Women with Breast Cancer

Objectives: Previous research on complementary therapy use in populations of patients with breast cancer has failed to differentiate among the different types of therapies and utilization patterns, resulting in wide discrepancies in prevalence rates. The purpose of this study was to develop more refined and rigorous estimates of the prevalence of complementary therapy use in women with breast cancer and their level of commitment to complementary therapy. Design and sample/setting: Using a cross-sectional, retrospective survey design, a random sample of 334 women with breast cancer was drawn from a Canadian provincial cancer registry. Using an intensive therapy inventory, women were asked to indicate the therapies and practices they had used since cancer diagnosis, frequency of use, amount of effort associated with using each therapy, and financial cost of therapy use. Results: A substantial proportion of women with breast cancer were found to be using complementary therapies, with between 19.5% (most cons...