Demographics and Clinical Profiles of Patients Visiting a Chiropractic Teaching Clinic in Malaysia

Objective

The objective of this study was to describe the demographics and clinical profiles of patients visiting a chiropractic teaching clinic in Malaysia.

Methods

A retrospective descriptive study was conducted using existing medical records of all new patients who visited the International Medical University Bukit Jalil teaching clinic between August 2018 and July 2019. Sociodemographic and lifestyle factors, information on location of presenting complaints, duration of complaint and referral sources were reviewed. Descriptive analyses including mean, mode, standard deviations (SDs), and frequencies were performed.

Results

Of the 1451 patients included in this study, the mean age was (SD) 34.3 (16.1) with 51.1% female. Most of the patients were Chinese (76.0%), followed by Malay (11.6%), Indian (7.72%), and others such as Punjabi and Sabah and Sarawak native (5.0%). Comparing referral sources, the main referrals were self-referred (26.6%) followed by friends and family referrals (25.0%) and other forms of social media and advertising (10.0%). The most frequent location of complaint was the lumbar and pelvic regions, 562 (38.73%) followed by head and neck 400 (27.57%), lower limb 173 (11.92%), upper limb 154 (10.61%), thoracic 133 (9.17%), and full spine 29 (2%).

Conclusion

This study provides important information that allows better understanding of patients presenting to a chiropractic teaching clinic in Malaysia. Such findings may contribute to the benchmark data for future strategic planning to ensure sufficient exposure on case mix among chiropractic interns in Malaysia.