Classifying knowledge used in complementary medicine consultations: a qualitative systematic review

Abstract

Background Complementary Medicine (CM) is widely used internationally but there is limited understanding of the forms of knowledge CM practitioners use in their clinical practice and how they use this knowledge in interactions with patients. This review aims to synthesise the existing evidence on the forms of knowledge that are mobilised, and the role of this knowledge in the interactions between practitioners and patients during CM consultations. It considered a diverse range of CM practice areas to develop a classification of CM practitioners’ knowledge use in consultations. Methods Systematic searches of health and sociology databases were conducted using core concepts, including complementary and alternative medicine, practitioners, and knowledge. Articles were included where they reported on data from recorded CM practitioner and patient consultations and offered insights into the types and applications of knowledge used in these consultations. 16 unique studies were included in the review. Data were extracted, coded and analysed thematically. Results Results demonstrate that diverse sources of knowledge were mobilised by practitioners, predominantly derived from the patients themselves –their bodies and their narratives. This reflected principles of patient-centredness. The use of discipline specific forms of knowledge and references to biomedical sources illustrated ongoing efforts towards legitimacy for CM practice. Conclusion CM practitioners are navigating tensions between what some might see as competing, others as complementary, forms of knowledge. The classification system provides a useful tool for promoting critically reflective practice by CM practitioners, particularly in relation to self-assessment of knowledge translation and patient interactions.

The salutogenic gaze: Theorising the practitioner role in complementary and alternative medicine consultations

“…These methods are relatively novel in studies of CAM. Among 20 papers published since 2000 that examine knowledge use in CAM consultations, identified via a qualitative systematic review we conducted previously (Davies et al., 2022), two studies use recorded consultations and DPIs, but the resulting papers only include dialogue from the interviews. In this article, our findings are based on analysis of the initial interviews, the content of the consultations themselves and the second interviews (DPIs), and we include data from all three sources.…”