[Chronic polyarthritis--treatment with alternative medicine. How frequent is (self-) therapy with alternative...

Between 1987 and 1992, we carried out an initial survey of 535, and second and third surveys of 552, patients with chronic polyarthritis, with the aim of obtaining information about paramedical and unconventional treatments and drugs used by those patients to self-treat their conditions. Some 32 to 64% had tried acupuncture, homeopathy and a number of obscure procedures (iridoscopy, cupping, and ozone treatment). Unconventional methods--use of vitamin E, enzymes, dietary measures--predominated. Over the years, the use of paramedical methods and drugs decreased, but the number of patients living on a diet (no pork, sausages or offal, but vegetarian food) remained constant. Attempts to separate the tares from the wheat, are reflected by the nomenclature: so-called unconventional therapies have the potential of becoming recognized forms of treatment. This appears to be the case with dietary measures and the use of vitamin E.