The long-term trend in utilization of traditional Chinese medicine and associated factors among older people in Taiwan

Background Both the size of the older population and the use of complementary and alternative medicine are increasing worldwide. This study evaluated the long-term trend in utilization of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and associated factors among older people in Taiwan. Methods Using the database of population-based interview surveys, we evaluated the one-month prevalence of TCM use among 13,945 older people aged over 65 years from 2001–2017. The sociodemographic status and medical comorbidities of older people who did and did not use TCM were compared by calculating adjusted odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) in the multiple logistic regressions. Results The one-month prevalence of TCM use increased from 5.5% in 2001 to 9.1% in 2017 among older people in Taiwan. Overall, 7.3% of older people had used TCM within the previous month. People with a history of heart disease (OR 1.62, 95% CI 1.24–2.12), use of folk therapy (OR 3.16, 95% CI 2.00–4.99), and purchase of non-prescribed Chinese herbal medicine (OR 2.08, 95% CI 1.48–2.91) were more likely to use TCM than the comparison group. However, age ≥80 years (OR 0.48, 95% CI 0.31–0.72) and previous hospitalization (OR 0.59, 95% CI 0.41–0.85) were associated with the reduced use of TCM. Conclusion From 2001–2017, the use of TCM increased in the older population in Taiwan. The use of folk medicine and purchase of non-prescribed Chinese herbal medicine were significant predictors for the use of TCM. © 2024 Huang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.