Unproved cancer remedies. A survey of use in pediatric outpatients.

Sixty-nine patients or parents of patients were interviewed during a five-week period. Each interviewee was given a questionnaire listing commonly recommended unproved drugs, diets, and miscellaneous treatments, and was instructed to respond to each remedy as follows: Have you tried it? Have you considered trying it? Has it been recommended by someone else? Six patients (8.7%) had tried at least one unproved remedy, four (5.8%) considered trying some other remedy, and recommendations to seek other remedies had been made to 17 patients (24.6%). Laetrile and assistance from faith healers were the remedies named most frequently.