[The Real World Study on Evaluating the Effect of Chinese Medicine Combined Western Medicine in Treating Rheumatoid Arthritis].

Objective To observe the curative effect of Chinese medicine (CM) combined West- ern medicine (WM) in treating rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients. Methods Totally 351 RA patients were allocated into two groups by their willingness, 52 cases in the control group and 299 cases in the combination group. Treatment of WM mainly included non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, glucocorti- coids, and anti-rheumatic drugs. And treatment based on syndrome differentiation of CM was adopted. Four diagnostic information of CM, joint pain, tenderness, swelling index, laboratory indices, and treat- ment expenses were observed. Disease activity score 28 (DAS28) , quality of life score [health assessment questionnaire (HAQ) ] , and efficacy of disease were assessed. Results After 2-3 months of treatment, the total effective rate was higher in the combination group than in the control group (P < 0. 05). After 6-12 months of treatment, the total effective rate, DAS28, and HAQ score were better in the combination group than in the control group (P <0. 05). There was no statistical difference in use of Western drugs, total expenses of hospitalization, total expenses of outpatient service between the two groups (P >0. 05). Patients who were treated by combined treatment, or having higher DAS obtained better effects after 2-3 months of treatment (P <0. 05). Patients who were treated by combined treatment, or having lower DAS obtained better effects after 6-12 months of treatment (P <0. 05). Conclusions Real world study (RWS) observed that combined CM and WM could get more significant effect. It also could effectively reduce disease activity, improve patients' QOL, with no economic burdens added.

[The effective parts of liangxue tongyu prescription on cooling-blood and activating-blood and analysis of chemical constituents by HPLC-MS and GC-MS].

In order to clarify material basis of effective parts of liangxue tongyu prescription, blood-heat and blood-stasis rat model induced by dry yeast was established. The changes of rectal temperature, blood viscosity and plasma viscosity were used to evaluate the cooling-blood and activating-blood effects of liangxue tongyu prescription and its parts. Compared with the model group, the extract from liangxue tongyu prescription, its volatile oil and n-butanol part could significantly reduce rectal temperature (P<0.01), and also reduce blood viscosity and plasma viscosity to various degrees (P<0.01 or P<0.05). So volatile oil and n-butanol part were primarily identified as effective parts of liangxue tongyu prescription. By using GC-MS with normalization method of area to analyze volatile oil of liangxue tongyu prescription, 70 compounds were identified, accounting for about 92.54%, mainly as ß-asarone, paeonol, α-asarone and shyobunone. 42 compounds such as peony glycosides, tannins, and iridoid glycosides were identified by HPLC-MS techniques and standard comparison. The study determined the effective parts of liangxue tongyu prescription and clarified the chemical composition providing the foundation for further studies on material basis of liangxue tongyu prescription.

[Experiences of Professor Zhou Zhong-ying in diagnosing and treating rheumatoid arthritis by data mining].

OBJECTIVE: To summarize Professor ZHOU Zhong-ying's academic ideas and clinical experiences in diagnosing and treating rheumatoid arthritis (RA). METHODS: Totally 153 clinical case reports were recruited. Data mining techniques like frequencies, factor analysis, and association analysis were used in order to find out laws of syndrome, pathogenesis, treatment methods, formulae and medication. RESULTS: By statistical analyses, we found 14 main symptoms, 76 commonly used clinical drugs, 8 core prescriptions for RA, and the correlation between main pathogeneses and related drugs. CONCLUSION: Results analyzed and summarized from mining his experiences in RA treatment were in line with clinical practice.

Randomized and controlled clinical study of modified prescriptions of Simiao Pill in the treatment of acute gouty arthritis.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the compatibility of a modified prescription of Simiao Pill in the treatment of acute gouty arthritis and to verify the clinical efficacy and safety of the drug through a clinical trial. METHODS: A randomized and controlled clinical trial was designed based on clinical epidemiological principles. A total of 107 patients with acute gouty arthritis were enrolled and randomly assigned to four groups. The first group (Group I) included 27 patients taking gout prescription I; the second group (Group II) included 27 patients taking gout prescription II; the third group (Group III) included 28 patients taking gout prescription III; and the fourth group (control group) included 25 patients taking indomethacin and Benzobromarone as a control group. The duration of the treatment in all 4 groups was two weeks. After the treatment, the index of blood uric acid, blood leukocyte count, score of clinical symptoms, etc. were observed and measured. RESULTS: The total clinical effective rate of the three different modified prescriptions of the Simiao Pill was above 96%, significantly superior to that of the control group (68%, P<0.05). In terms of the improvement of main symptoms, the scores of four symptoms in all TCM treatment and control groups decreased after treatment, with statistically significant differences (P<0.05). Moreover, the scores markedly fell more so in the three Chinese herb groups than in the control group, and especially in Group III (P<0.05). There was a statistically significant difference in blood uric acid values before and after the treatment in the same group but no significant inter-group difference was seen. CONCLUSION: The modified prescriptions, based on the clinical research, clinical experience and traditional Chinese medicine theory, did show a better effect than Western medicine in this clinical study. Moreover, the prescriptions were precise, with the herbs inexpensive and readily available. The patients had good compliance with less adverse reactions noted. The modified prescription has a favorable prospect for future development and is worthy of further blind trials with larger samples.