The population of "developed" countries, those with advanced conventional medicine, despite the undeniable continuous progress of it, decides in a significant percentage to entrust the improvement of health to providers of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) services. The term complementary and alternative medicine refers to a wide set of health practices that are not part of the tradition of a particular country and are not integrated into the dominant health system. There is no European classification of CAM. The general situation is such that every country within the EU decides whether to regulate this area. THE AIM OF THE RESEARCH: The primary goal is to investigate how many patients in the area of the city of Dubrovnik, Mokošica and Župa Dubrovnik use CAM, and to get an opinion on the effectiveness of it. The hypothesis is that patients in the specified area use CAM. Secondary goals are to get an insight into the reasons for use in general, what type of CAM and for the disease of which body system is used. WORKING METHOD AND MATERIALS: A semi structured questionnaire has been constructed for the research, which consisted of 13 closed-type questions with multiple answers where only one of the answers offered could be rounded up. The subjects consisted of family medicine patients under the jurisdiction of the Dubrovnik Health Center aged 30 - 80 who voluntarily accepted to fill out an anonymous questionnaire. Prior to the investigation, the questionnaire was submitted for verification by the competent doctor. RESULTS: 63 (55.8%) female respondents and 50 (44.2%) male respondents participated in the survey. Of the 113 respondents, 76.1% used CAM and 23.9% did not use it. As reasons for using CAM, 38.4% of respondents report that they believe CAM will help them, 37.2% want to try a new treatment. The largest number of subjects was treated with CAM for diseases of the musculoskeletal system, 32.6%, due to diseases of the digestive system 22.1%, due to respiratory diseases 16.3%. Respondents with secondary qualifications are the most represented with 54% of respondents. Of the 86 respondents who used CAM, 65% felt it helped them in part, 20% felt it helped them completely, while 15% felt that it did not help them at all. DISCUSSION: A 2008 survey in Croatia had 46% of those who used CAM, the one from Čakovec as many as 82%, while in this survey there were 76%. It has also been confirmed that, as elsewhere in Croatia, the use of medicinal plants is the most common method of treatment. CONCLUSION: The main starting hypothesis that family medicine patients in the processed area use CAM has been confirmed, with the largest number of users using medicinal plants and its preparations. There are no significant differences by age, gender or level of education that affect the practice of alternative treatment methods. Most CAM users are to some extent satisfied with the results of the treatment.