Situation of Thai Traditional Medicine Services at Tambon Health Promoting Hospitals

Abstract

Rationale and Objective: To promote Thai traditional medicine (TTM) services, the Department for Development of Thai Traditional and Alternative Medicine launched a pilot project to provide TTM services at tambon (subdistrict) health promoting hospitals (THPHs) during 2010-2013. A total of 206 THPHs participated in this study and one TTM doctor was assigned to each of the hospitals. The aim of this study was to survey and observe the situation of TTM services so that such services could be further developed systematically. Methodology: A questionnaire was designed and mailed to each of the TTM doctors in all 206 THPHs during June-July 2013. All of the doctors returned their completed questionnaires; and data were analyzed with descriptive statistics. Results: Of all TTM doctors at the THPHs, 64.08% were applied TTM practitioners and 35.92% were TTM practitioners, 93.25% of whom were licensed to practice in all four TTM branches, i.e. Thai medicine, Thai pharmacy, Thai midwifery and Thai massage. Among all service recipients, more than 80% received therapeutic and rehabilitative care with Thai massage and Thai medications, mostly for musculoskeletal disorders. On average, each hospital had 10.98 items of Thai herbal drugs under the National List of Essential Medicines; the top five mostly used Thai drugs were turmeric capsule, fa-thalai-jon (kariyat) capsule, ya-prasa-mawaeng (brinjal), phaya-yor cream, and compound phetsangkhart (veldt-grape) capsule. The TTM services have been provided in a proactive manner with other multidisciplinary team members in the communities, especially in caring for paresis/paralysis patients and postpartum mothers (99.5%). Discussion and Conclusion: A TTM doctor is one of the healthcare providers that play a key role in ren-dering health services at a tambon health promoting hospital. The utilization of TTM services has been rising steadily, mostly for curative and rehabilitative care. The services are provided by the multidisciplinary team and satisfactory to healthcare recipients. Thus, TTM service development efforts should be continually promoted and expanded so that there is one TTM doctor at each of tambon health promoting hospitals throughout the country.