Clinical effect of traditional Chinese medicine in the treatment of advanced colorectal cancer

Zhao Lanmei; Zhang Lei; Chen Jialu; Huang Shuai; Ouyang Yiran; Song Qing

doi:10.3760/j.issn.1673-4777.2024.06.025

Abstract：Objective To investigate the clinical effect of traditional Chinese medicine in the treatment of advanced colorectal cancer.Methods A total of 338 patients with advanced colorectal cancer who were treated in Suzhou Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital Affiliated to Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine from January 2015 to December 2022 were retrospectively selected as the research objects.According to different treatment methods,the patients were divided into traditional Chinese medicine group(180 cases)and traditional Chinese and western medicine group(158 cases).The traditional Chinese medicine group was mainly treated with traditional Chinese medicine,without any chemotherapy,targeted therapy and immunotherapy.In the traditional Chinese and western medicine group,chemotherapy was given priority to,combined with traditional Chinese medicine comprehensive treatment.Two months was a cycle,and the two groups were treated for 2 consecutive cycles.The main clinical symptoms,Karnofsky performance status(KPS)score,clinical efficacy and progression free survival(PFS)were compared between the two groups.Results There was no significant difference in gender distribution,age,site of disease,pathological type,degree of differentiation,stage,metastatic site,KPS score and traditional Chinese medicine syndrome type between the two groups(all P＞0.05).After treatment,the incidences of fatigue,poor appetite,abdominal distension,abdominal pain,constipation and loose stool in the traditional Chinese medicine group were lower than those in the traditional Chinese and western medicine group(all P＜0.05).The improvement of KPS score in the traditional Chinese medicine group was better than that in the traditional Chinese and western medicine group(P＜0.001).The total effective rate of the traditional Chinese and western medicine group was higher than that of the traditional Chinese medicine group[84.8％(134/158)vs 73.3％(132/180)](P＜0.05).The PFS of the traditional Chinese and western medicine group was 3 months longer than that of the traditional Chinese medicine group(Log-rank x2=4.729,P=0.030).Conclusions Comprehensive treatment of traditional Chinese medicine or comprehensive treatment of traditional Chinese medicine combined with chemotherapy can improve the clinical effect,clinical symptoms and KPS score,and prolong PFS.Traditional Chinese medicine treatment alone can better improve clinical symptoms and KPS score,while the combination of traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine has advantages in prolonging PFS.