Traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine can be used together to compliment each other:
TRADITIONAL Chinese medicine (TCM) can be used to treat many a lifestyle ailment, but here’s the definitive word on cancer from a renowned Beijing doctor: Don’t rely on it to cure cancer.
‘The first line of defence is to see an oncologist and act on his advice, whether it’s surgery, chemotherapy or radiotherapy, because that’s what will deal with the tumour,’ says Yu Ren Cun, who heads the department of oncology at the Beijing Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine and is a specialist in the complementary treatment of tumours.
TCM comes in mainly as a complementary treatment, he points out, as it deals effectively with the side effects of chemo and radiotherapy. ‘TCM works well to complement Western cancer therapy so both can be used concurrently. Its strength is in regulating the body’s systems, reducing toxicity, thus increasing the efficacy of oncology treatment,’ he says.
The two medical systems have their strengths and weaknesses, which is why patients would benefit best from an integrative approach. However, the integrative TCM-Western oncology treatment approach has to be carried out by TCM cancer specialists, and not just any general TCM practitioner, Prof Yu cautions.
Trained in Western medicine, Prof Yu is among the first batch of Chinese doctors trained in both Western medicine and TCM – a practice encouraged by the Chinese government in the 1960s. After his Western medicine and then TCM training, he spent more than 40 years researching the application of TCM in cancer treatment, and is the foremost authority on it today.
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