Kontakt 2008, 10(2):288-294 | DOI: 10.32725/kont.2008.044

Results selected from the research work "Traditional Chinese medicine and current nursing"Nursing

Lucie Rolantová^*, Valérie Tóthová

Jihočeská univerzita v Českých Budějovicích, Zdravotně sociální fakulta, katedra ošetřovatelství

The traditional Chinese medicine belongs to the oldest treatment methods. It is focused on supporting the body in re-establishment of equilibrium and harmony, which were disturbed. The diagnostics in the traditional Chinese medicine is also considerably different from methods employed in west medicine. The traditional Chinese medicine helps treat a number of health problems, but is also serves as a prevention of the disease origination.
Over recent years, the Czech Republic became a target country of immigrant groups as well as individuals from neighbouring countries and remote areas. In our country, the most numerous immigrants are members of Chinese and Vietnamese minorities. The traditional Chinese medicine may be very important for them in their everyday life. This should be taken into account when granting quality nursing care.
The research target of our work was to determine what the health problems in members of the Chinese and Vietnam minorities to be treated with the help of the traditional Chinese medicine are, and what treatment methods are most frequently employed.
The research part of our work was processed with the help of qualitative research. Semi-structured interview was used for the data accumulation, which was the same for Chinese and Vietnamese minorities. The research sample included 18 respondents, 9 from the Chinese minority and 9 from the Vietnamese minority, living in the Czech Republic.
The results indicate that the traditional Chinese medicine is more frequently used by members of the Chinese minority, most typically in health problems of lower degrees of severity. In the Vietnamese minority, the traditional Chinese medicine occupies only the second position, if the west medicine is not able to help. It is, however, obvious, that in the case of health problems of a lower degree of severity they also rather prefer the traditional Chinese medicine.

Keywords: traditional Chinese medicine; health problems; minorities

Received: September 8, 2008; Accepted: November 28, 2008; Prepublished online: December 12, 2008; Published: December 17, 2009  Show citation