Market Survey And Identification Of Traditional Chinese Materials Medicas In Hong Kong

ObjectiveThe reports of adverse drug reaction due to the confused use of traditional Chinese Materials Medicas occurred in Hong Kong occasionally.These did not only adversely affected the aim of providing public health care,but also delayed the treatment leading to physical harm or even life-threatening situation.In order to understand the situation on the confusion of Chinese Materials Medicas in the market,this study use the form of market survey to collect samples and try to explore a simple and quick micro-characteristic identification method.It would not only help people who have not been professionally trained in traditional Chinese Materials Medicas when purchasing Chinese Materials Medicas to buy real Chinese Materials Medicas successfully,but would also provid a valuable and practical method to facilitate the daily work of the professionals in the industries.MethodsThe survey was conducted from August 2014 to February 2017.A list of more than 100 Chinese Materials Medicas with potential confusing or quality problems was summarized according to the information of literature review and and daily experience in the market.10 samples for each were raondomly collected from the Chinese Materials Medicas retailers and wholesalers in 18 districts of Hong Kong and were undergone physical and microscopic identification afterwards.When two or more samples for each case have the same confusion or quality problems,the situation would be considered included in the research area.The target of the study was to collect 100 different cases of confusing or quality problems.One of the focuses of this study was the microscopic picture and characterization of the seed category,due to the fact that the relevant information in the literatures were rather lacking and the depth of field is very shallow at high magnification;meaning that one photo could not clearly reflect all the features of the tiny seeds.The proposed identification method was using micro-character identification system process based on the use of the latest micro-camera,high-power microscope for mobile phone and new technology of extending depth of field for shooting the characteristics of tiny Chinese Materials Medias.All the photo would be put in an electronic databases.Users can cooperate with the phone for the macro function of the lens,photographed Chinese Materials Medicas photos and real-time online classification by the characteristics of the database to match automatically and use the photo feature search function to match manually.The above micro-identification system is basically feasible,but because the formal database involves a large amount of funds and data,the need for further research funding or cooperation with the university to complete.In addition,the user also need to be trained to master the skills of shooting micro-photo.ResultsA total of more than 99 different cases of confused species or quality problems were identified during the course of this investigation.Among them,a total of 78 different cases,in which 62 involving species from different sources of origin,2 involving wrong processing,30 were involved in adulteration of non-medicinal parts or impurities,and 5 were related to over processed by sulfur dioxide,have never been published.The study would help understanding the situation of Hong Kong Chinese Materials Medicas market.In addition,the combination of physical photography and a new technique of photographing and processing microscopic images were used to take the micro-feature photographs of the seed-type Chinese medicinal materials.The four-year study on survey of Chinese medicine products helped us to understand comprehensively the situation of the Chinese Materials Medicas market in Hong Kong.The results would provide an important reference for the formulation and implementation of the supervision and management measures of traditional Chinese Materials Medicas market in Hong Kong.This study explored the development of shooting microscopic characteristics of Chinese medicines by mobile phone.Chinese medicine practitioners or citizens could use the high-power microscope camera mounted on the mobile phone to shoot Chinese Materials Medicas and match the photos using extension of focal length in this study through the internet.This allows quick identification and evaluation of Chinese Materials Medicas quality and safety.