Changing circumstances in the treatment with herb medicines and therapeutic results in our clinic during the past fifteen years / 日本東洋医学雑誌

ABSTRACT

At the end of 1986, herb medicines were switched over to newly modified preparations, and at the same time the usual dosage was changed from 5g to 7.5g per day. Therapeutic results in our experiences on 1864 diseases seen in 1270 patients during fifteen years were nevertheless rather stable, attaining good and moderate effects in about 60%, fair effect in about 20% and unchanged in about 20% of the cases. This fact might mean that the dosage of 5g per day can be sufficient to obtain satisfactory results especially in the patients with good drug-“Sho” signs correspondence.<br>Better results than the average were obtained in the diseases of common cold, dysmenorrhea, headache, constipation, abdominal pain and piles. The incidence of adverse effects showed decreasing tendency from 2.0 or 2.8% to 1.4% in spite of the increase of usual dosage of herb medicines. Among apparent adverse effects there can be mixed some hyperreactive phenomenon infrequently seen in the cases with excellent drug-“Sho” signs correspondence. In such a case further reduction of dosage would be worthy of trial.<br>Positive treatment of in-patients with herb medicines proved to be of benefit not only to the patients, but also to doctors to attain proficiency in medical performance. Recent good retults obtained among younger patients and wider as well as deeper interest of younger doctors in traditional Oriental medicine could be interpreted as some signs of gradual maturity of social circumstances around Oriental medicine.