Abstract
Based on the nationwide survey into inpatients' utilization of the health service covered by China's urban basic medical insurance from 2008 to 2010, we analyzed the use rate, cancer profile and combined use of anticancer Chinese patent medicines (CPMs) on 51,382 insured cancer patients by using statistical, bi-clustering and network methods. We found that 42.4% of 51,382 cancer patients used 33 anticancer CPMs, and 51.7% used 71 anticancer Western medicines (WMs). The CPMs were most often used in lung (52%) and nasopharynx (52%) cancer patients, and least in bladder cancer (21%) and leukemia of unspecified cell type (21%) patients. The cost per patient for all 33 anticancer CPMs was 2069RMB, lower than that of the WMs (3458RMB). The cancer profile of commonly used CPMs and WMs for the top 17 cancers (>500 sampled patients) were provided, indicating anticancer CPMs had a broad spectrum of cancers and lacked selectivity in cancer treatment (CPM mean CV = 49%; WM mean CV = 152%). Moreover, 24.8% of the cancer patients used both CPMs and WMs, and CPM-WM combined use networks were constructed for four major cancers. This first nationwide analysis revealed the use characteristics and herb-drug combined use patterns of insurance covered anticancer CPMs in China. The study offers valuable information to guide future studies of the precision, safety and standard use of CPMs.
Highlights
Chinese patent medicines (CPMs), as a new fashion to modernize traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), play an increasingly important role in China’s medical practice
In top 17 cancers, use of 33 anticancer CPMs was highest in lung and nasopharynx cancer patients, and was higher than those using anticancer Western medicines (WMs) (44% and 45%)
Anticancer CPMs were more commonly used than anticancer WMs for liver cancer (20% more), kidney cancer (14% more), pancreatic cancer (10% more), and esophagus cancer (8% more)
Summary
Chinese patent medicines (CPMs), as a new fashion to modernize traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), play an increasingly important role in China’s medical practice. CPMs, together with Western medicines (WMs) and Chinese herbal medicines, are the three categories of drugs in China’s National Basic Medical Insurance Drug Catalogue (NBMIDC) [2], since China launched the National Basic Medical Insurance System in 1998. Anticancer CPMs is a special category in NBMIDC anticancer drugs. Several hospitals reported that anticancer CPMs are increasingly being used in cancer treatment, and even growing faster than Western drugs [3,4,5]. With the wide use and increasing interest of CPMs in cancer treatment, a comprehensive and in-depth analysis for anticancer CPMs is urgently required
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