[Whole-process prevention and treatment model of traditional Chinese medicine for coronavirus disease 2019 epidemics].

ABSTRACT

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has a long history in treating infectious diseases, and the form of intervention varies with different medical conditions and disease types. "The battle field of Chinese doctor for anti-epidemic" was formed in fighting against severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemics in China, and from the battle, valuable experiences of using TCM for prevention and treatment had been obtained. During responding to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemics, we followed the principle of keeping summary and perfection while treament. And a whole process of TCM pattern or a model was organized, including early prevention in communities, cluster intervention in isolated places, comprehensive intervention in mobile cabin hospitals, centralized treatment in designated hospitals and rehabilitation support in rehabilitation posts. Thus, the innovation of whole process of TCM intervention was involved in the "trench warfare" strategy and platform system for prevention and treatment of new infectious COVID-19 epidemics. At different stages or conditions, different TCMs were used to play advantageous roles to solve various problems and elevate the effects of prevention and treatment of the disease. The construction of TCM mobile cabin hospitals was an innovation of organization form that might offset the constraints in technology and scale of simple community isolation or simple hospital treatment, exploring a new way for TCM to cope with public health emergencies.