TCM Zheng Classification and Clinical Trials 2014

In continuation of the last year's special issue " TCM Zheng Classification and Clinical Trials, " the time for 2014 issue has come. Now we are on the way from TCM Zheng classification in clinical trial to development of clinical practice guideline. Clinical effectiveness is what matters most in any treatment, including traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). Many clinical trials have been conducted in China to evaluate the effectiveness of TCM, but many of the studies are with poor quality and may be inaccessible to non-Chinese scientists. As shown in Figure 1, the number of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) for TCM is small in PubMed database. The situation may be partly due to the methodological difficulties, such as trial design and implementation of blinded trials of TCM Zheng classification (Bian Zheng, syndrome differentiation) treatments. These facts and figure illustrate that the present special issue focuses on an intractable topic in TCM research. This 2014 special issue contains 9 articles accepted from a total of 19 submissions consisting of 6 research articles, 1 systematic review (SR) article, and 2 narrative review articles. Two cohort studies were gathered, " Chinese Herbal Decoction Based on Syndrome Differentiation as Maintenance Therapy in Patients with Extensive-Stage Small-Cell Lung Cancer: An Exploratory and Small Prospective Cohort Study " ; 357 herbal decoctions were prescribed for 29 patients based on Zheng classification to observe the treatment effect and treatment length of herbal decoctions. Another cohort study " The Functional Difference of Dendritic Cells in HBeAg Negative Chronic Hepatitis B Patients with Three Different Spleen Deficiency Syndromes and the Therapeutic Evaluation of Chinese Medicine Intervention Based on Syndrome Differentiation " by H. Song et al. suggested that Chi-nese medicine intervention according to Zheng classification could advance the maturity and function of dendritic cells and improve the therapeutic effect. One case analysis study, " Study on TCM Syndrome Differentiation of Primary Liver Cancer Based on the Analysis of Latent Structural Model " by X. Yue et al., analyzed 559 inpatients records to provide evidences for TCM Zheng classification of primary liver cancer. Another paper focuses on clinical practice guideline; " Enhanced Evidence-Based Chinese Medicine Clinical Practice Guidelines in Hong Kong: A Study Protocol for Three Common Diseases " by A. Lu et al. presented a novel of three-phases clinical practice guidelines research protocol for insomnia, chronic gastritis, and cerebral infarction. This study may serve as model for future guidelines development …