Chemotherapy treats many types of cancer effectively. But it is also notorious for causing side effects such as diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, etc. These treatment side effects lower the quality of life for the patients, and make the survivorship of cancer even harder.
What’s worse, patients may have to stop treatments altogether because of the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy.
Many researchers have turned to alternative medicine for another way to treat cancer and the harmful side effects of some treatments.
They believe that Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is an invaluable resource for modern treatment of cancer and other diseases.
Dr. Yung-Chi Cheng—AFCR scientific advisory board member, is a renowned scientist at the Yale University School of Medicine. With support from AFCR’s partner organization in the USA, Dr. Cheng and his team have made important research progress in using TCM to treat the often agonizing side effects of chemotherapy. The Chinese medicine, dubbed PHY906, is a four-herb combination based on an ancient herbal recipe Huang Qin Tang. In early clinical trials, PHY906 has been shown to effectively relieve the side effects of chemotherapy, such as diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting. Laboratory tests suggest that the herbs also seem to enhance the treatment efficacy of chemotherapy. This discovery allows patients to cope better and withstand more easily the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy, which may help patients continue their treatment and thereby, increase their odds of beating cancer. PHY906 is on track to become one of the first USA FDA-approved oral herbal medicines for cancer treatment.
Through the modernization of Traditional Chinese Medicine, more effective cancer treatments with less side effects may be made available to cancer patients in Asia and worldwide.
AFCR’s vision for advancing TCM cancer drugs begins with high quality research: conducting preclinical studies using highly standardized research materials and protocols, and performing rigorously monitored clinical trials according to the internationally recognized standard, the Good Clinical Practice (ICH-GCP). And since its inception, AFCR proudly joined the Consortium for Globalization of Chinese Medicine, a Hong-Kong-based non-profit organization, to promote modernization of TCM.
The cancer research progress shared here is for public education information only. The actual clinic results of the cancer diagnosis, detection or treatments may differ from person to person.