Abstract Background Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) hasbeen widely used to treat various diseases in China for thousands of years and has shown satisfactory effectiveness. However, many surveys found that TCM receives little recognition from Western medicine (WM) physicians and students. At present, TCM is offered as a compulsory course for WM students in WM schools. Objective This study aimed to investigate whether TCM courses can affect the WM students’ attitude toward TCM. Methods WM students from Xiangya Medical School were invited to completeaweb-based questionnaire before and immediately after a TCM course. Their attitude toward TCM and treatment preferences for different kinds of diseases were tested. The Attitude Scale of TCM (ASTCM) was used. The main part of the ASTCM was designed to measure the attitude of medical students towardTCM. It consisted of 18 items, divided into cognitive dimension (5 terms), emotional dimension (8 terms), and behavioral tendencyfactor (5 terms). Results Finally, the results of 118 five-year program (FYP) and 36 eight-year program (EYP) students were included. For FYP students, there was a significant increase in the total mean score (66.42, SD 7.66 vs 71.43, SD 7.38; P .05). The treatment preference of FYP students in acute ( P =.02), chronic ( P =.003), and physical diseases ( P =.02) showed remarkable change. A major change was also detected in internal diseases ( P =.02), surgical diseases (perioperative period; P =.01), and mental illnesses ( P =.02) in EYP students. This change mainly appeared as a decline in WM preference and an increase in TCM and WM preference. Conclusions The study showed that earlier exposure to the TCM course increased the positive attitude toward TCM in students majoring in WM. The results provide some suggestions for arraging TCM courses in WM schools.
He et al. (Fri,) studied this question.