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What Do Oncology Patients Know and Think About Apitherapy?


 Purpose In clinical practice, the use of apitherapy products in the treatment of oncology patients is not very common. For this reason, it is extremely important for cancer patients to have accurate information about apitherapy and to use these products in a controlled manner. This study was conducted to determine the knowledge level of oncology patients about apitherapy, their use of apitherapy products and their opinions about these products.Methods This descriptive research was carried out between January 2019 and January 2020 at the oncology unit of a university hospital. Power analysis was used to determine the sample size of the study, and a total of 87 patients constituted the sample of the research with a confidence interval of 85%. A questionnaire consisting of questions investigating the sociodemographic characteristics of the patients and their knowledge, opinions and practices about apitherapy was used to collect the data. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and the SPSS 21 package program. Results The level of knowledge of the patients about apitherapy is quite low (41.4%) and they received the information they gained from their family/friends (63.9%). The rate of use of apitherapy products by patients is low (27.6%) and the most frequently used product is honey (37.4%). Patients think that more scientific evidence is needed for the use of apitherapy methods in cancer patients (83.9%).Conclusions Healthcare professionals should conduct more scientific research on the use of apitherapy products in cancer treatment and inform patients about the usage areas and risks of apitherapy.