Abstract

Objectives: This study was performed to review the research trends in the treatment of eating disorder in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). Methods: The CNKI database (China National Knowledge Infrastructure) was searched under the key words ‘Eating Disorder’, ‘Anorexia Nervosa’, and ‘Bulimia Nervosa’. Results: Thirteen articles were selected. These included 2 studies on bulimia nervosa, and 11 studies on anorexia nervosa. According to study design, studies were classified into 1 randomized controlled trial, 2 single group before-and-after studies, and 8 case reports. According to therapy method, they included 11 herbal medicine studies, and 2 complex treatment studies. The most common pattern identification was ‘liver qi depression’ (肝氣鬱結), and the most used herb was ‘Root of Bupleurum falcatum’ (柴胡). Most of the studies showed effective results. Conclusions: The results of our study indicated that TCM clinical studies on eating disorder were being conducted more actively than in Korean medicine. Korean medical treatment might be effective to relieve eating disorder symptoms. In the future, more scientifically designed clinical studies should be performed to prove the effectiveness of traditional Korean medicine treatment on eating disorder.

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