摘要
As cancer rates rise globally, standard care is being questioned; new approaches involving immune therapies are emerging. With this shift comes a corresponding shift in the use and potential of herbal medicines and extracts. The focus of this article, which has evolved from a presentation at the Second Beijing International Symposium on Integrative Medicine （BISIM May 19-20, 2012）, is particularly on Chinese medicine, but is generalizable to Eastern medicine morebroadly and to other herbal traditions. Until recently, herbal and related treatments have been used as adjuvants to conventional care - for reducing side-effects, enhancing cytotoxicity, and sometimes, undesirably counteracting the efficacy of chemotherapy and radiation. Now, in the context of a new class of immune-based cancer therapies, herbal and other complementary modalities are looked at asenhancers of the body＇s immunity.
As cancer rates rise globally, standard care is being questioned; new approaches involving immune therapies are emerging. With this shift comes a corresponding shift in the use and potential of herbal medicines and extracts. The focus of this article, which has evolved from a presentation at the Second Beijing International Symposium on Integrative Medicine （BISIM May 19-20, 2012）, is particularly on Chinese medicine, but is generalizable to Eastern medicine morebroadly and to other herbal traditions. Until recently, herbal and related treatments have been used as adjuvants to conventional care - for reducing side-effects, enhancing cytotoxicity, and sometimes, undesirably counteracting the efficacy of chemotherapy and radiation. Now, in the context of a new class of immune-based cancer therapies, herbal and other complementary modalities are looked at asenhancers of the body＇s immunity.
