Table 1 Databases, MeSH keywords, and qualifiers used in the search strategy

AMED

MeSH: ‘cardiovascular diseases’ [exploded] AND (‘complementary therapies’ [exploded] OR ‘dietary supplements[exploded] OR ‘plants, medicinal’ [exploded] AND ‘data collection’ [exploded] Where MeSH terms were unavailable, the following terms were combined: [complementary medicine$ or complementary therapy$ or alternative medicine$” or “supplement$ or herb$ or homeopath$ or osteopath$ or acupuncture or Chinese medicine$ or mind-body therapy$] AND cardiovascular disease AND [‘utilisation” OR “utilization” OR ‘ prevalence’ OR ‘use’]

Blackwell Synergy

CINAHL

Health & Society

PubMED Entrez (indexes Medline and Biomed Central)

Scopus (indexes EMBASE)

Science Direct

Web of Science