Researching the utilisation of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM): Where to from here?

Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is now a major component of healthcare and also a popular choice of treatment for many consumers in a large number of countries. The increasing level of CAM consumption raises a number of important issues of direct relevance to health researchers and practitioners (regarding such topics as potential drug interactions, integrative health service planning and the equity and accessibility of provision of effective treatments). However, there is limited research focusing on the use of CAM and CAM users, and we still know little about CAM consumers and consumption around the world. In response, this paper outlines four areas for future research in this field: gender and CAM consumption; locality and CAM consumption; health service utilisation and CAM consumption; and motivations, experience and perceptions of CAM users. These four areas offer health researchers one particular framework for further exploration of this neglected field of study.