The retrospective study of traditional Chinese medicine combined with the WHO three steps analgesic solution in the treatment of cancer pain

Abstract

Objective To study the characteristics of the inpatients with cancer pain, the application of WHO three steps analgesic solution (three steps analgesic) and the application of traditional Chinese analgesic (TCM). Methods Retrospective investigation of distribution of cancer pain, situation of pain, application of TCM, and the application of conbination of three steps analgesic and TCM treatment, by using, clinical data from the oncology department of afflicated hospital of Liaoning university of TCM ranging from May, 2009 to June, 2010. Results 47.4% (517/1 090) of patiens were combined with cancer pain. Among the patients, majority were the middle-aged and old (59.19%) and male patients (57.63%). The abdominal pain (57.45%) and chest pain (37.91%) were topranks, and the distributions of pain period such assustainability (65.37%), moderately (53.38%), bloated pain (49.71%) and dull pain (29.98%) had larger proportion. The TCM excessive patterns(50.87%) were more than the TCM deficiency patterns (28.63%) or mixed TCM patters of excessive and deficiency patterns (20.50%). A total of 46 patients had mild pain, 76.09% of whom used TCM, 15.22% used first step drugs, and 8.69% used combination treatment, while 276 patients with moderate pain used second step analgesic, and 91.67% of them also used TCM, the rest195 patients with severe pain used third step analgesic, and 55.38% of them also used TCM. The time of pain release of TCM alone or combination of TCM and three steps analgesic were longer than the three steps analgesic alone. Conclusions Early intervention of traditional Chinese medicine on the patients with mild pain could reduce the dose of first step analgesic drugs, and TCM application at the second step could delay the speed of transtformfrom second to third step pain, and TCM could prevent the side effects of morphine when patients were with severe pain. Key words: Cancer pain; Three steps analgesic; Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM); Treatment model