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Tran DNH, Yeh HF, Huang WJ, Wu PW, Liao YJ, Hwang SJ, Kung YY, Yang JL, Wu TP, Hsu CH, Chen FP. Efficacy evaluation of Chinese herbal medicine, VGH-BPH1, for patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia: A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, and crossover study. J Chin Med Assoc 2022; 85:639-646. [PMID: 35385425 DOI: 10.1097/jcma.0000000000000717] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) can affect quality of life and cause various complications. Previous studies have suggested that Chinese herbal medicine can alleviate symptoms in patients with BPH. This study aimed to investigate whether the Chinese herbal medicine prescription VGH-BPH1 can alleviate BPH symptoms when used as an add-on treatment. METHODS In this crossover, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, patients with BPH were randomly segregated into two groups: group A received VGH-BPH1, and group B received a placebo for 8 weeks. Subsequently, after a 2-week wash-out period, the two groups were switched to the opposite treatment for another 8 weeks. The International Prostate Symptoms Score and Aging Male Symptoms Score were adopted as the primary outcomes to assess improvement in BPH and patient quality of life. The secondary outcomes were the International Index of Erectile Function, Constitution Chinese Medicine Questionnaire, uroflowmetry results, and postvoid residual urine volume. RESULTS VGH-BPH1 treatment significantly decreased the International Prostate Symptoms Score total score (p = 0.027); however, no significant difference was observed between the treatment and placebo groups. The Aging Male Symptoms Score "joint pain and muscular ache" score in the VGH-BPH1 group was significantly lower than that of the placebo group (p = 0.022). The "physical exhaustion" score also exhibited a decreasing trend when both groups were compared (p = 0.057). CONCLUSION Although VGH-BPH1 treatment did not outperform the placebo in terms of improving BPH symptoms, it resulted in improvement in several quality of life indicators when relative to the placebo. Future research using a larger sample size with appropriate amendments to the protocol should be conducted to further investigate the effects of VGH-BPH1.
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Affiliation(s)
- Diem Ngoc Hong Tran
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Hsin-Fu Yeh
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Department of Family Medicine, St. Martin De Porres Hospital, Chiayi, Taiwan, ROC
| | - William J Huang
- Department of Urology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Pei-Wen Wu
- Tian-Yun Chinese Medicine Clinic, Taoyuan, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Ying-Ju Liao
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Shinn-Jang Hwang
- College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Department of Family Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Yen-Ying Kung
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Jen-Lin Yang
- College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Ta-Peng Wu
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Chung-Hua Hsu
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Division of Chinese Internal Medicine, Linsen Chinese Medicine and Kunming Branch, Taipei City Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Fang-Pey Chen
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, College of Medicine, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
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Tran DNH, Hwang IH, Chen FJ, Tseng YP, Chang CM, Tsai SJ, Yang JL, Wu TP, Hsu CH, Chen FP, Kung YY. Core prescription pattern of Chinese herbal medicine for depressive disorders in Taiwan: a nationwide population-based study. Integr Med Res 2020; 10:100707. [PMID: 33665095 PMCID: PMC7903348 DOI: 10.1016/j.imr.2020.100707] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/07/2020] [Revised: 11/10/2020] [Accepted: 11/27/2020] [Indexed: 11/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Depressive disorders (DD) affect not only mood and behavior but also various physical functions. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has been shown to have some benefits in treating DD. However, one formula or one single herb might be not show high efficacy when used to treat depression. Thus, this study aimed to examine the core prescription pattern of Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) among patients with DD in Taiwan as a reference for related research and clinical applications. Methods All patients, who had been diagnosed with major depressive disorder or minor depression or dysthymia without any other baseline diseases and had at least one CHM outpatient clinical visit from 2002 to 2011, were extracted from three randomly sampled cohorts, namely the 2000, 2005 and 2010 cohorts of the National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) of Taiwan. The collected data was analyzed to explore the patterns of herbal products. Results There were 197,146 patients with a diagnosis of DD and of these 1806 subjects had only a diagnosis of DD and utilized CHM. The most common formula was Gan-Mai-Da-Zao-Tang (12.19%), while Suan-Zao-Ren (3.99%) was the most commonly prescribed single herb. The core pattern of prescriptions consisted of a combination of Gan-Mai-Da-Zao-Tang, Jia-Wei-Xiao-Yao-San, Chai-Hu-Jia-Long-Gu-Mu-Li-Tang, He-Huan-Pi, Yuan-Zhi and Shi-Chang-Pu. Conclusions This study describes the CHM core prescription pattern used to treat patients in Taiwan with DD and it is a potential candidate for study in future pharmacological or clinical trials targeting DD.
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Affiliation(s)
- Diem Ngoc Hong Tran
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - I-Hsuan Hwang
- Quality Management Center, Cheng Hsin General Hospital, Taiwan
| | - Fun-Jou Chen
- School of Chinese Medicine & Graduate Institute of Chinese Medicine, College of Chinese Medicine, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan
| | - Yuan-Pu Tseng
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Ching-Mao Chang
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Shih-Jen Tsai
- Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Jen-Lin Yang
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Ta-Peng Wu
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Chung-Hua Hsu
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
- Division of Chinese Internal Medicine, Linsen Chinese Medicine and Kunming Branch, Taipei City Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Fang-Pey Chen
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Yen-Ying Kung
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
- Corresponding author at: No. 201, Section 2, Shipai Road, Beitou District, Taipei City, 112 Taiwan, ROC.
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Huang CW, Tran DNH, Li TF, Sasaki Y, Lee JA, Lee MS, Arai I, Motoo Y, Yukawa K, Tsutani K, Ko SG, Hwang SJ, Chen FP. The utilization of complementary and alternative medicine in Taiwan: An internet survey using an adapted version of the international questionnaire (I-CAM-Q). J Chin Med Assoc 2019; 82:665-671. [PMID: 31305349 DOI: 10.1097/jcma.0000000000000131] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/16/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND In Taiwan, numerous studies have been conducted to investigate the use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). However, most of them focused on specific diseases or the use of particular methods. Therefore, the results of those studies were quite different and difficult to compare with those of studies from other countries. The International CAM Questionnaire (I-CAM-Q), meanwhile, is a unified tool that can provide comparable results for studies conducted worldwide. Thus, the aim of this study was to discover the proportions of people in Taiwan receiving CAM treatments from different types of health care providers by using an adapted version of I-CAM-Q (I-CAM-QT). METHODS I-CAM-QT was developed by translating the Korean version of I-CAM-Q (I-CAM-QK) into traditional Chinese language because of the similarity of CAM usage and doctor licensing system. This study had two stages: the first was a pretest survey used to adjust the questionnaire, while the second was an internet-based survey used to collect data from the community. RESULTS Of the 1200 survey respondents, 37% and 37.7% were prescribed or advised to use Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) by Western medicine (WM) physicians and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) doctors, respectively. Other than CHM, dietary supplements and massage were the forms of CAM most commonly prescribed or recommended by WM physicians or TCM doctors. Overall, walking and relaxation techniques were the most commonly used self-help practices (used by 61.9% and 40.4% of the respondents, respectively). Additionally, 70.3% of the respondents had used at least one kind of dietary supplement in the past 12 months. CONCLUSION Regarding the utilization of CAM in Taiwan, this internet-based survey revealed that CHM, dietary supplements, and massage were the types of CAM most commonly prescribed or recommended by WM physicians or TCM doctors.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ching-Wen Huang
- Department of Science in Korean Medicine, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea
| | - Diem Ngoc Hong Tran
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Tsai-Feng Li
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Yui Sasaki
- Department of Applied Korean Medicine, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea
| | - Ju Ah Lee
- Hwa-pyeong Institute of Integrative Medicine, Incheon, South Korea
| | - Myeong Soo Lee
- Clinical Medicine Division, Korea Institute of Oriental Medicine, Daejeon, South Korea
| | - Ichiro Arai
- Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Nihon Pharmaceutical University, Saitama, Japan
| | - Yoshiharu Motoo
- Department of Medical Oncology, Kanazawa Medical University, Ishikawa, Japan
| | - Keiko Yukawa
- Department of Health Policy and Technology Assessment, National Institute of Public Health, Saitama, Japan
| | - Kiichiro Tsutani
- Faculty of Health Sciences, Tokyo Ariake University of Medical and Health Sciences, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Seong-Gyu Ko
- Department of Science in Korean Medicine, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea
- Department of Applied Korean Medicine, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea
| | - Shinn-Jang Hwang
- Department of Family Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Department of Family Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
| | - Fang-Pey Chen
- Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, School of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
- Center for Traditional Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
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