Traditional Chinese medicine prescriptions and herbs for the treatment of hypothyroidism:a narrative review

The increasing prevalence of hypothyroidism,which can cause endocrine dysfunction,abnormal neurological function,and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular injuries,poses serious health problems.Thyroid hormone supplementation constitutes the current main therapeutic method for hypothyroidism,yet it has many limitations and risks and is not suitable for everyone.Therefore,it is necessary to seek alternative and complementary treatment methods.It has been proven in practice that traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)possesses multi-channel comprehensive characteristics for the treatment of hypothyroidism and has more advantages than single thyroid hormone supplementation.Through a comprehensive examination of existing literature about TCM efficacy in addressing hypothyroidism,we have meticulously consolidated the most recent research findings on prescriptions and herbal substances employed in the treatment of this condition.Furthermore,we have explicated their respective functions in the management of hypothyroidism,thereby offering valuable perspectives and recommendations for the prospective utilization of natural remedies in its treatment.

Herbal Traditional Chinese Medicine and suspected liver injury: A prospective study

AIM To analyze liver tests before and following treatment with herbal Traditional Chinese Medicine(TCM) in order to evaluate the frequency of newly detected liver injury.METHODS Patients with normal values of alanine aminotransferase(ALT) as a diagnostic marker for ruling out pre-existing liver disease were enrolled in a prospective study of a safety program carried out at the First German Hospital of TCM from 1994 to 2015. All patients received herbal products, and their ALT values were reassessed 1-3 d prior to discharge. To verify or exclude causality for suspected TCM herbs, the Roussel Uclaf Causality Assessment Method(RUCAM) was used.RESULTS This report presents for the first time liver injury data derived from a prospective, hospital-based and largescale study of 21470 patients who had no liver disease prior to treatment with herbal TCM. Among these, ALT ranged from 1 × to < 5 × upper limit normal(ULN) in 844 patients(3.93%) and suggested mild or moderate liver adaptive abnormalities. However, 26 patients(0.12%) experienced higher ALT values of ≥ 5 × ULN(300.0 ± 172.9 U/L, mean ± SD). Causality for TCM herbs was RUCAM-based probable in 8/26 patients, possible in 16/26, and excluded in 2/26 cases. Bupleuri radix and Scutellariae radix were the two TCM herbs most commonly implicated. CONCLUSION In 26(0.12%) of 21470 patients treated with herbal TCM, liver injury with ALT values of ≥ 5 × ULN was found, which normalized shortly following treatment cessation, also substantiating causality.

Herb-herb interaction in traditional Chinese medicine：a review of pharmacokinetics-based interaction in Herb-Pairs

"Herb-Pairs",also known as pair drugs,refers to a prescription consisted of two relatively fixed traditional Chinese medicine,is the most basic,most simple and most common form of medication prescription in traditional Chinese medicine compound compatibility.It is not a random combination of two herbs,nor is the simple accumulation of efficacy,but the simple and delicate experience of ancient Chinese medicine practitioners.As a bridge between single drug and prescriptions,it is the embodiment of the regular and dialectical connotation.Therefore,research on Herb-Pairs has always been the most basic and most important entry point for compound compatibility studies.However,the interaction between herbs and herbs is an effect with a downside as well as benefits.The beneficial herb-herb interaction in Herb-Pairs include mutual promotion,mutual enhancement,mutual restraint between two drugs and counteract toxicity of another drug.And the harmful herb-herb interaction in Herb-Pairs includes mutual inhibition and antagonism.Al of these interactions areby means of affecting the metabolism of components to play a therapeutic effect.Using the pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic(PK-PD)binding model,the combination of drug metabolism and pharmacodynamics can further elucidate the influence on effect caused by drug concentration and metabolism,which can help elucidate the mechanism of drug action.Consequently,in this review,the herb-herb interactions in terms of pharmacokinetic were summarized to elucidate rule of TCM compatibility.

Determination of vanadium in food and traditional Chinese medicine by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectroscopy

Various experimental conditions were described for the vanadium determinationby graphite furnace atomic absorption spectroscopy (GFAAS). The experiments showed that whenatomization took place under the conditions where the combination of a pyrolytic coating graphitetube and fast raising temperature were used and the temperature was stable, the signal peak shapescould be improved, the sensitivity was enhanced, and the memory effect was removed. The vanadium infood and traditional Chinese medicinal herbs can be accurately determined using the standard curvemethod.

Traditional Chinese medicine for prevention and treatment of hepatocarcinoma: From bench to bedside

Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM) has played a positive role in the management of hepatocarcinoma. Hepatocarcinoma patients may present Qi-stagnation, damp-heat, blood stasis, Qi-deficiency, Yin-deficiency and other TCM syndromes(Zheng). Modern treatments such as surgery, transarterial chemoembolization(TACE) and high intensity focus ultrasound treatment would influence the manifestation of TCM syndromes. Herbs with traditional efficacy of tonifying Qi, blood and Yin, soothing liver-Qi stagnation, clearing heat and detoxifying and dissolving stasis, have been demonstrated to be potent to prevent hepatocarcinogenesis. TCM has been widely used in all aspects of integrative therapy in hepatocarcinoma, including surgical resection, liver transplantation, TACE, local ablative therapies and even as monotherapy for middle-advanced stage hepatocarcinoma. Clinical practices have confirmed that TCM is effective to alleviate clinical symptoms, improve quality of life and immune function, prevent recurrence and metastasis, delay tumor progression, and prolong survival time in hepatocarcinoma patients. The effective mechanism of TCM against hepatocarcinoma is related to inducing apoptosis, autophagy, anoikis and cell senescence, arresting cell cycle, regulating immune function, inhibiting metastasis and angiogenesis, reversing drug resistance and enhancing effects of chemotherapy. Along with the progress of research in this field, TCM will contribute more to the prevention and treatment of hepatocarcinoma.

The role of autophagy in the treatment of osteoporosis by Chinese medicines(natural)

Osteoporosis is one of the common orthopaedic diseases,characterised by increased bone fragility due to reduced bone mass and microstructural degeneration,posing a great threat to patients’quality of life and safety.In recent years,Chinese medicine(natural)has had a unique advantage in the treatment of osteoporosis and has shown good efficacy.Autophagy is an inherent cellular survival mechanism for the removal and recycling of damaged proteins and organelles and plays an important role in maintaining the stability of the intracellular environment and organ function.Therefore,this article aims to provide a comprehensive review of these Chinese medicines(natural)for the treatment of osteoporosis through autophagy.They have been intensively studied and reported to have effects such as promoting osteogenesis and anti-bone resorption.The Chinese medicines include plants such as Cistanche deserticola,Epimedium,Curculigo orchioides Gaertn,Achyranthes bidentata Blume,Leonurus japonicus Houtt,Ginseng,Chuanxiong Rhizome,Eucommia ulmoides,Morindae Officinalis Radix,Curcuma longa,Polygoni Cuspidati Rhizoma et Radix,Anemarrhena asphodeloides Bunge,Salvia miltiorrhiza Bge and Pueraria Lobata,thus providing evidence for the use of alternative herbal therapies for the effective treatment of osteoporosis.

A brief overview of traditional Chinese medicine prescription powered by artificial intelligence

Traditional Chinese medicine prescription is one of the treasures of traditional Chinese medicine(TCM).There are tens of thousands TCM prescriptions accumulated in the past thousands of years,corresponding to different diseases,symptoms and therapeutic goals.The correspondences are so complicated that there is an urgent need to leverage new technologies such as artificial intelligence(AI)to analyze,understand and utilize them effectively.In this paper,we present a brief overview of this direction,where current research progress on TCM prescription powered by AI is summarized.Our summarization focuses on three aspects,TCM prescription mining that aims at understanding the TCM prescription,TCM prescription or herb knowledge base construction that aims at extracting knowledge to support the TCM prescription-related study,and TCM prescription discovery that aims at utilizing AI technologies to further energize TCM.It is encouraging to see that steady progress in this direction has been made recently.Besides,a toy experiment on image-based TCM herb recognition by using convolutional neural networks is also conducted.It basically verifies that it is promising to use AI technologies to address challenging tasks in TCM.We also point out several research topics that could be cooperatively performed by researchers from the two disciplines.

Effects of four traditional Chinese medicinal herbs on plasma level of IL-6 and induced TNF level in burned rats with wound infection

Objective : Effects of the decoction of Coptis chinensis Franch. , Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi , P. chinense schneid and Lonicera japonica Thunb. on burn rats with wound infection were observed. Methods : Fifty-six rats were randomly divided into three groups :sham burn , burn wound infected control(BWIC) and burn wound infected and treatment(BWIT). The plasma was harvested from the experimental rats. Plasma IL-6 activity was measured by using the IL-6-dependent cell line B9. The isolated mono-nuclear cells (MNCs) were induced by LPS and cultured for 24 h. TNF in the culture supernatant was detected by ELISA. Results: Plasma IL-6 levels of BWIC and BWIT were significantly elevated at postburn (PB) 24 and 48h , and IL-6 level of BWIC was significantly higher than that of BWIT at PB 48h (P<0. 01). The induced TNF level of BWIT was significantly higher than that of BWIC at PB 24 and 48 h , and that of sham burn at 24 h(P<0. 01). Conclusion : The results indicate that this decoction could inhibit MNCs releasing from pro-inflammatory cytokines which are believed as an endogenous pyrogen.

Applicability of Zipfs Law in Traditional Chinese Medicine Prescriptions

Objective Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)prescriptions have been used to cure diseases in China for thousands of years,in which many TCM herbs have no definite common quantity.Some key TCM herbs are commonly used and thus deserve in-depth investigations based on a more acceptable classification method.This study analyzes whether TCM prescriptions follow Zipf's law and attempts to obtain the thresholds of key TCM herbs based on the application of Zipfs law;Methods A total of 84,418 TCM prescriptions were collected and standardized.We tested whether Zipf's law and Zipfs distribution fit the Chinese herb distributions.A linear fitting experiment was performed to verify the relationship between the frequency distribution and frequency of TCM herbs.Results The distribution of TCM herbs in TCM prescriptions conformed to Zipf's law.Accordingly,the thresholds were obtained for the key TCM herbs.Conclusion The distribution of TCM herbs in TCM prescriptions follows Zipfs law.

Case report: Treating postpartum SUI with acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine

Background:Stress urinary incontinence(SUI),is the most common type of urinary incontinence affecting women.SUI has a significant impact on psychosocial functioning and quality of life.Biomedical treatments,such as surgery,often result in post-operative complications.In China,traditional Chinese medicine tends to be the treatment of choice for SUI.Case presentation:We present a 35-year-old patient who developed SUI following forceps delivery and was treated successfully with acupuncture and Chinese herbs.Traditional Chinese diagnosis,including channel and acupoint palpation revealed the patient had a syndrome pattern of liver/kidney deficiency,disordered bladder qi transformation,all of which lead to enuresis.Acupuncture,both body and scalp needling,were performed.Herbs were prescribed adjunctively.Conclusion:Traditional Chinese medicine modalities may be considered for treatment of SUI based on appropriate syndrome pattern assessment.

Determination of components in traditional Chinese medicines associated with promoting or inhibiting urinary stone formation

Objective:To measure oxalate,calcium,and sodium contents of traditional Chinese medicines(TCMs)that are commonly used to prevent and dissolve urinary stones to exclude the possibility that long-term use of such medicines promotes stone formation.The second objective was to measure citrate,potassium,and magnesium contents in the same medicines to provide possible clues about the mechanisms of prevention and dissolution of urinary stones by TCMs.Methods:Ten of the most commonly-used TCMs for preventing and dissolving urinary stones were chosen and subjected to ion chromatography(IC)to measure water-soluble and total oxalate and citrate contents.Inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry(ICPAES)was used to measure calcium,potassium,magnesium,and sodium contents in a water extract and in digestion liquid.Results:Average contents of water-soluble oxalate,calcium,and sodium in the water extract were 41.92,84.32,and 22.82 mg/100 g,respectively,far below the normal dietary intake of adults in China.The average contents of citrate and magnesium in water extracts were 268.99 and 66.65 mg/100 g,respectively,below the recommended intake for adults.These ion contents are therefore insufficient to inhibit the formation of urinary stones.The average content of potassium in the water extract was 867.71 mg/100 g,which was relatively abundant,so taking the prescription used in this experimental protocol can increase the body’s potassium content to some extent.Conclusions:Long-term use of TCMs would not increase the risk of urinary stone formation.The potassium content in TCMs is high,which is one possible reason for the prevention of urinary stones by TCMs.

Research progress on the regulation of androgen receptor signaling pathway in the treatment of prostate cancer by traditional Chinese medicine monomers

The prevalence of prostate cancer in males worldwide is increasing every year.Androgen and androgen receptor drive the development of prostate cancer and are important targets for the treatment of prostate cancer.A growing number of reports indicate that the traditional Chinese medicine has a clear advantage in the prevention and treatment of prostate cancer.This article provides an overview of the in vitro and in vivo studies of different traditional Chinese medicine monomers acting on the androgen receptor-signaling pathway in prostate cancer.

Research Progress of Traditional Chinese Medicine in the Treatment of Carotid Atherosclerosis

Carotid atherosclerosis is a partial manifestation of arteriosclerosis of organism.In recent years,its incidence rate is increasing year by year.Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)has a broad prospect in the clinical development of CAS treatment by holism concept and the principle of treatment based on syndrome differentiation.This paper reviews the etiology,pathogenesis,TCM dialectics and TCM treatment of carotid atherosclerosis,in order to provide theoretical guidance for TCM treatment of CAS patients.

Traditional Chinese Medicinal Syndromes and Treatment in Colorectal Cancer

Colorectal cancer remains the third most common malignancy worldwide. According to the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), colorectal cancer is related to spleen-deficiency, damp-heat, and toxicity accumulation. Traditional Chinese medicine has been confirmed to effectively reduce toxic side effects and enhance curative effects of chemotherapy, palliate clinical syndrome, prevent recurrence and metastasis, improve quality of life and immune function, and prolong survival time in colorectal cancer. However, TCM theoretical and syndrome differentiation study has lagged far behind due to progression of therapy model in colorectal cancer. As a type of drug treatment, there are some common biological basis between chemotherapy, targeted therapy and anti-cancer herb therapy in colorectal cancer, such as apoptosis, cell senescence and autophagy. There are growing needs to explore the effect mechanism and compatibility of anti-cancer herbs, to further enhance the efficacy of TCM treatment in colorectal cancer.

Aknowledge-guided and traditional Chinese medicine informed approach for herb recommendation

Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)is an interesting research topic in China’s thousands of years of history.With the recent advances in artificial intelligence technology,some researchers have started to focus on learning the TCM prescriptions in a data-driven manner.This involves appropriately recommending a set of herbs based on patients’symptoms.Most existing herb recommendation models disregard TCM domain knowledge,for example,the interactions between symptoms and herbs and the TCM-informed observations(i.e.,TCM formulation of prescriptions).In this paper,we propose a knowledge-guided and TCM-informed approach for herb recommendation.The knowledge used includes path interactions and co-occurrence relationships among symptoms and herbs from a knowledge graph generated from TCM literature and prescriptions.The aforementioned knowledge is used to obtain the discriminative feature vectors of symptoms and herbs via a graph attention network.To increase the ability of herb prediction for the given symptoms,we introduce TCM-informed observations in the prediction layer.We apply our proposed model on a TCM prescription dataset,demonstrating significant improvements over state-of-the-art herb recommendation methods.

从“气化”浅述国医大师葛琳仪运用风药治疗脾胃病之学术思想

[目的]介绍国医大师葛琳仪教授(以下简称葛教授)分层次施用风药辨治脾胃病的临床特色及其临证经验。[方法]通过理论溯源,跟师随诊,整理并分析葛教授基于气化理论运用风药治疗脾胃系疾病的临床医案,总结葛教授巧施风药辨治脾胃病的思路、心得和用药特色,并附医案一则加以佐证。[结果]气化是生命的基本活动,气化异常是疾病产生的重要原因。葛教授指出,脾胃病的基本病机是“气化异常”,常从“气化”切入,巧施风药以调畅气机,恢复脾升胃降功能,维稳五脏气机,具体分为四个层次:以风药疏肝和脾、壮气运脾、燥湿健脾以及搜风通络养脾。常用的风药有柴胡、防风、黄芪、升麻、佛手、紫苏梗、苍术、娑罗子、桑叶、藿香、草果、厚朴、佩兰、徐长卿、炒僵蚕等及其组成的药对、药串。[结论]葛教授临证精于辨证,从“气”切入,按不同层次巧施风药治疗脾胃病,特色鲜明,疗效显著,其学术思想值得临床借鉴和推广。

不同类型中药材种植农户绿色生产行为绩效差异研究——基于赤峰市中药材种植户调查数据的实证分析

农户绿色生产行为是顺应农业绿色发展的必然要求。本文采用数据包络分析(DEA)及倾向得分匹配法(PSM),选取860份赤峰市中药材种植农户微观调研数据,基于农户分化视角探讨中药材种植农户绿色生产行为生产绩效差异问题。结果表明:首先,中药材种植农户实施绿色生产行为有助于生产绩效的提升,但不同类型中药材种植农户间存在差异,其全样本平均生产绩效为0.75,生存型农户最低,为0.65,生产型农户最高,为0.82,生活型农户和功能型农户较为接近,分别为0.80和0.79;其次,从平均处理效应(ATT)计算结果看,中药材种植农户实施绿色生产行为可以增加生产绩效、总产量和总产值;再次,绿色生产行为对不同类型中药材种植农户生产绩效的提升作用存在群体差异,其中生存型、生活型农户实施绿色生产行为对生产绩效影响不显著,功能型、生产型农户则具有显著影响,但生产型农户呈现负向影响。因此,要强化农户绿色生产行为实施力度,提高不同类型中药材种植农户绿色生产意识。另外应保护传统意义上的生存型和生活型农户,强化生产型农户的减施力度,培育功能型农户群体规模,推动社会福利改善,进而促进中药材产业绿色健康发展。

The traditional Chinese medicines treat chronic heart failure and their main bioactive constituents and mechanisms

Chronic heart failure(CHF)is a severe public health problem with increasing morbidity and mortality,any treatment targeting a single session is insufficient to tackle this.CHF is characterized by reduced cardiac output resulting from neurohumoral dysregulation and cardiac remodeling,which might be related to oxidative stress,inflammation,endoplasmic reticulum stress,apoptosis,autophagy,mitochondrial function,and angiogenesis.These molecular mechanisms interact with each other through crosstalk.Historically,Chinese medicinal herbs have been widely applied in the treatment of CHF,and therapeutic effects of Chinese medicinal herbs and their ingredients have been scientifically confirmed over the past decades.Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)with multiple components can confront the different pathogenesis of CHF through multiple targets.This review analyzes commonly used TCM patent drugs and TCM decoctions that are applicable to different stages of CHF based on clinical trials.Diverse bioactive ingredients in Chinese medicinal herbs have been found to treat CHF via multiple molecular mechanisms.This review comprehensively covers the key works on the effects and underlying mechanisms of TCM,herbal ingredients and synergistic effects of constituent compatibility in treating CHF,providing additional ideas to address this threat.

黄芩-黄连药对及其活性成分治疗糖尿病肾病的作用机制研究进展

糖尿病肾病(DN)是糖尿病最常见的并发症之一,中医认为湿热内蕴是DN的关键病机,治法应以“清湿热”为主。黄芩-黄连药对是清湿热法的代表药对,现代研究表明该药对及其主要活性成分对DN具有治疗作用。梳理近年来黄芩-黄连药对及其主要活性成分的相关文献,从调节糖脂代谢紊乱、减少肾脏细胞凋亡、缓解肾脏炎症和纤维化、调节肠道微生物和调控基因转录等方面进行综述,为黄芩-黄连药对的临床运用和研发提供系统的理论依据。

上海植物园草药园历史现状与发展思考

上海植物园草药园作为中草药资源保育、研究和展示的重要场所,历经数10年的发展,取得了一系列成果。园区建设始于20世纪70年代,经过多次改造和扩充,以适应不断增长的药用植物迁地保育和科普教育需求及景观提升要求。在药用植物收集方面,草药园致力于保育和传承中医药文化,通过引种、收集和保护各类药用植物,为中医药研究提供了丰富的资源。同时,草药园积极开展展览与行业交流,促进中草药知识的普及和传播。园内分区明确,引种收集丰富,植物病虫害防治得力,行业交流频繁,科学普及独具特色,中医药文化宣传深入人心,智慧信息化发展迅速。展望未来,草药园将深入开展中医药文化宣传和科学普及活动,营造更加自然、和谐的环境,在收集物种丰富、群落生境优良的基础上,开展生物多样性长期监测,示范推广生物多样性友好城市案例,并积极探索智慧信息化发展新模式,为中草药产业的可持续发展和弘扬中医药文化作出更加卓越的贡献。