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Use of medicinal plants in patients with chronic kidney disease from Peru
Percy Herrera-Añazco1, Alvaro Taype-Rondan1, Pedro J Ortiz2
1Universidad San Ignacio de Loyola, Unidad de Investigación para la Generación y Síntesis de Evidencias en Salud, Lima, Peru.
Objective:
To describe the use of medicinal plants in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) in public healthcare centers in Peru.
Methods:
A cross-sectional study was conducted in patients with CKD in healthcare centers of three Peruvian regions: Lima, Arequipa, and Ucayali. A structured questionnaire which included socio-demographic data, medical antecedents and characteristics of the use of medicinal plants was used. Prevalence ratios (PR) and 95 % confidence intervals (95% CI) were calculated using crude Poisson regressions with robust variances.
Results:
A total of 599 patients with CKD were evaluated, of which 300 (50.1%) reported the use of medicinal plants (160 [30.3%] used these plants for CKD), 379 reported that medicinal plants were not harmful, while 166 (27.8%) stopped using allopathic medicine to use medicinal plants only. In the adjusted analysis, the frequency of the use of medicinal plants for CKD was similar between Lima and Arequipa but was lower in Ucayali than in Lima (PR: 0.32, 95% CI: 0.14 - 0.76). In addition, a higher frequency of the use of medicinal plants for CKD was observed in patients with more advanced stages of CKD (PR: 1.55, 95% CI: 1.06-2.26) and in patients who were aware they had CKD (PR: 2.79 95% CI: 1.39-5.63).
Conclusions:
Half of the patients used medicinal plants and about one-third used it for CKD. This use was lower in Ucayali and higher in both the patients who knew they had CKD and those with more advanced stages of the disease. Given these results, physicians should ask and inform regarding medicinal plants consumption to their CKD patients.
