Sticking The Curative Effect Of Combined Chinese Medicine Treating Bronchial Asthma With Chronic Duration

AimThrough the use of acupoint-application therapy to treat non-acute phase of bronchial asthma, we aim to observe changes in the patients’ symptoms and signs, number of incidences and clinical presentation to conclude its efficacy. Concurrently, we aim to find out the clinical efficacy of acupoint-application therapy to treat yang deficiency and phlegm coagulation pattern in bronchial asthma. Through these findings, we hope to figure out the disease mechanism of yang deficiency and phlegm coagulation pattern in bronchial asthma, and the use of pattern differentiation and treatment in bronchial asthma.MethodologyThis study selects66patients that meet the both western medicine and TCM diagnostic criteria of yang deficiency and phlegm coagulation pattern of bronchial asthma. They come from the outpatient clinic in Dong Fang Hospital, Beijing. According to1:1ratio, all patients were randomly divided into2groups, treatment group and control group. Treatment group receives both acupoint-application therapy and chinese decoction, whereas the control group only has chinese decoction as their treatment.In acupoint-application therapy, the patient receives6hours of acupoint-application therapy on both fei shu (BL13), dan zh o ng (RN17) and tidntu (RN22), for consecutively14days. The chinese decoction formula warms yang and dispel phlegm, and is consumed one formula, twice daily (200ml)/per day, for14days.The observation indicators for efficacy are symptoms and signs, lung function test (FEV1values and FEV1values in litres) and number of incidences of wheezing during day and night. Using SPSS17.0, the data were put through statistical analysis for difference between both groups.Results1. The evaluation of the therapeutic effect of this study combines the changes in symptoms and signs of patients and comparing results of2lung function tests. According the changes in FEV1values before and after treatment, total efficiency in treatment group is28.5%, control group28.0%. Altogether15patients had more than15%improvement in FEV1values. There are no significant differences between both groups.2. After14days of treatment, the average improvement in FEV1values obtained by treatment group is higher than control group but no statistically significant difference between both groups. The average improvement in FEV1values in litres of0.17L for treatment group is higher than that of control group (p>0.05).3. According differences in aggregated points of TCM symptoms and signs, the total efficiency in treatment group is25patients (75.7%) and22patients (66.6%) in control group (p>0.05).4. In comparing the aggregated points of TCM symptoms and signs before and after7and14days of treatment, it is found that both groups’ reduction in aggregated points is statistically significant.5. After7days of treatment, there are significant differences in the following symptoms for the treatment group:wheezing, lung crackles, cough and sputum, whereas the significant differences in the control group are wheezing and lungs crackles. The treatment group is effective in expediting the recovery of cough and sputum after7days. After14days of treatment, both groups had significant differences in the following symptoms:wheezing, lung crackles, cough and sputum.6. Using Spearman’s Rank-Order Correlation test, there is a weak positive correlation between percentage change in FEV1value and differences in aggregated points of TCM symptoms and signs, which is statistically significant (rs=0.306, p<0.05). There is also a weak positive correlation between percentage change in FEV1value in litres and differences in aggregated points of TCM symptoms and signs, which is statistically significant (rs=0.282, p<0.05).ConclusionIn the treatment of yang deficiency and phlegm coagulation pattern of non-acute phase of bronchial asthma, there is evidence that acupoint-application therapy help in the improvements of patients’ symptoms and signs, lung function tests, reduce the degree and severity of asthma attacks,. However, due to several discussed reasons, some of these indicators do not achieve significant differences in their statistical analysis, thus we cannot completely affirm the efficacy of acupoint-application therapy in this study. However, no evidence does not equate to no efficacy, we hope to conduct more studies and tests in the future to verify acupoint-application therapy’s efficacy.