ABSTRACT
We report a case of a 74-year-old woman who suffered from uncomfortable heat under her right shoulder blade and felt anxiety about general fatigue that had been worsening mainly in the summer. She visited our Kampo clinic because of insufficient effect of various types of drug that had been prescribed by 3 doctors for about a year. We made the diagnosis of somatic symptom disorder and suggested Kampo therapy with decoction. We thought this might be caused by liver qi depression, blood deficiency, and blood stasis because he had symptoms of dry skin, cold of feet, deeply located fine pulse, pale and purple tongue with yellow thick fur, fullness in the chest and hypochondrium. Therefore we administered keppuchikuoto modified formula. Her symptom improved within about a month after taking this formulation. There was no recurrence of the physical symptom and fatigue in the summer during taking medicine for about 20 months. Evidence-based treatment in somatic symptom disorder has not been established and some cases are resistant to treatments in modern Western medicine. Kampo medicine may be useful and hopeful.
ABSTRACT
We have reported cases of idiopathic sensorineural hearing loss treated with Japanese Kampo medicine in the past, but they all exhibited deficiency pattern. This time, we experienced cases of idiopathic sensorineural hearing loss, which exhibited medium pattern and excess pattern. Case 1 is a 57-year-old man. He had a chief complaint of ringing and hearing loss in his right ear from 3 days ago and was diagnosed with right idiopathic sensorineural hearing loss Grade3b. He exhibited medium pattern with liver qi depression and blood stasis, and was administered shosaikoto and keishibukuryogan. He was cured after 2 weeks. Case 2 is a 48-year-old man. He had a chief complaint of hearing loss in his right ear and dizziness from 2 days ago and was diagnosed with right idiopathic sensorineural hearing loss Grade4a. He exhibited excess pattern with liver qi depression and blood stasis, and was administered daisaikoto and tokakujokito for 1 week. After that, we switched tokakujokito to keishibukuryogan and continued treatment, but there remained a slight difference in hearing around the treble part, and it stopped at a remarkable recovery.
ABSTRACT
This study was aimed to elucidate the 5-HT3R molecular mechanism of Radix Paeoniae Albaextract (RPAE) as drug intervention in the treatment of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) model rats with liver-qi depression pattern.PMS model rats with liver-qi depression pattern were prepared.And then,the model was treated with RPAE.The protein distribution of 5-HT3AR and 5-HT3BR in the frontal lobe was evaluated by the immune fluorescence technology and western blot.The results showed that there were positive expressions of 5-HT3AR and 5-HT3BR in frontal lobe of rats in each group.Compared with the normal group,the 5-HT3AR and 5-HT3BR protein expression levels of the frontal lobe in the model group increased significantly (P < 0.05).Compared with the model group,the 5-HT3AR protein expression level in the frontal lobe decreased significantly after RPAE treatment (P < 0.05).In conclusion,RPAE regulated the protein expressions of 5-HT3AR and 5-HT3BR in frontal lobe,which may be one of the mechanisms for its treatment of PMS with liver-qi depression pattern.
ABSTRACT
This study was aimed to reveal the roles of biological factors T3, T4 and TSH in the pathogenesis of liver-qi invasion syndrome and liver-qi depression syndrome of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) in the body. Thus, we may expound the connotation of conceptpotential stagnation ofqi and blood. Female workers of Jinan and Qingdao were selected as target groups by epidemiological cross-sectional survey. And specially trained investigators were responsible for screening patients referred to criterion on the international diagnostic standards and syndrome diagnosis of PMS. Patients' blood was taken as samples during the follicular phase (6 to 14 days), luteal phase (15 to 23 days), premenstrual phase (24 to 28 days) and the menstrual phase (1 to 5 days), respectively. Blood samples were disposed according to requirements of radioimmunoassay. Single factor analysis of variance was used in the comparison with the level of T3, T4 and TSH in menstrual blood for different time intervals of the case group and the normal group by SPSS 10.0 statistical software. The results showed that T3 levels of patients with either syndrome were significantly reduced during the premenstrual phase and the menstrual phase (P < 0.05). There were no significant changes on the level of serum T4 and TSH before and after the occurrence of the disease. Both of them were significantly increased during each phase of the menstrual cycle. It was concluded that changes of T3, T4 and TSH were one of the mechanisms in disease with liver-qi invasion syndrome and liver-qi depression syndrome. The micro change was the essence ofpotential stagnation of qi and blood, which was the body condition of this disease.
ABSTRACT
This study was aimed to explore brain regions which were closely related to the disease onset of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) with liver-qi depression. The BOLD-functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used in the study. The processing of imaging data was based on the SPM 8 software and the REST software of the matlab platform. Each cluster was more than 389 continuous voxel. The brain region with single voxel of P < 0.05 (corrected) was defined as region with statistical significance. The 2 Sample T-Test was applied in the case group and the control group. The results showed that compared with the normal control group, the frontal lobe, occipital lobe, insula, limbic lobe, basal nuclei, and cingulate gyrus were activated in the PMS with liver-qi depression cases. It was concluded that the disease onset of PMS with liver-qi depression cases was related to brain regions such as frontal lobe, occipital lobe, insula, limbic lobe, basal nuclei, and cingulate gyrus.
ABSTRACT
Shigyakusan, a traditional Japanese prescription, has been prescribed for chronic diseases including gastritis, upper respiratory tract infection, hepatitis, irritable colon and so on. The effectiveness of shigyakusan against pain, however, has only been rarely reported. Here we report that shigyakusan was effective on pain such as intractable chronic and acute pain in 26 patients. Shigyakusan is composed of 7.5 g (dry weight/day) : saiko, shakuyaku, kijitsu and kanzo. Shigyakusan and kososan mimic the composition of saikosokanto. Pain alleviation periods were 3-90 days (26 ± 19). Pains were recognized in various regions including side of the flank and the thorax, the back, the tongue, the perineum, the elbow joint, the head and plantar areas. Abdominal findings as tension of the rectus abdominis, kyokyokuman (discomfort of the hypochondrium area) and sinkahiko (tenderness of the hypochondrium area) were recognized 58%, 46% and 38%, respectively. All patients were recognized with depressive conditions. Shigyakusan alleviated acute and chronic pain that had not been improved with Western medicine. Therefore, shigyakusan may be considered for prescription in patients with incurable pain.