Four Clinical Trials in My Speech on Cancer

Four Clinical Trials Cited in My Speech on Cancer

When China started modernizing, over 50 years ago, Chinese scientists began to study the mechanisms of TCM modalities in a systematic way. As Chinese medicine has spread around the world, scientists in many countries have joined the search to understand and explain how acupuncture works, and to analyze the biochemical properties of Chinese herbs.            

Hundreds of thousands of studies have been conducted in every application of Chinese medicine. Thousands of studies have been done in the application of Chinese medicine to cancer-related issues. If you are familiar with Pubmed, the online service of the National Library of Medicine, you will see that Pubmed has accumulated 962 research studies just on the fairly narrow topic of using acupuncture for cancer symptoms.

At this point, I will present a selection of studies to illustrate the scope of research on Chinese medicine and cancer. The studies I quote are focused on two areas. One area is the treatment of cancer symptoms, and the other area is the treatment of side effects from conventional cancer therapies of chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Again, I only have time to present a synopsis of these studies, rather than a detailed explanation. I hope those of you who are interested in this subject will visit Pubmed and explore this fascinating aspect of cancer research in more depth.

Two common side effects of conventional cancer therapy are cancer-related fatigue and xerostomia, or dry mouth.

A study published in the December, 2012 issue of the Journal of Clinical Oncology, was designed to assess the effectiveness of acupuncture for cancer-related fatigue in patients with breast cancer. The randomized controlled trial compared 227 patients who received acupuncture and usual care, with 75 patients who received usual care alone (in this case, “usual care” consisted of giving patients a booklet with information about managing fatigue). The study showed significant improvement in general fatigue levels in the acupuncture group. The intervention also improved all other measurable aspects of fatigue, including physical and mental fatigue, anxiety and depression, and quality of life. This study concluded that acupuncture is an effective intervention for managing the symptom of cancer-related fatigue and improving patients' quality of life.

After receiving radiation therapy to the head and neck, Xerostomia (dry mouth) is a common problem among cancer patients. Quality of life is impaired, and available treatments are of little benefit. A small pilot study comparing the effects of acupuncture versus sham acupuncture on xerostomia symptoms was conducted at the Shanghai Cancer Center and published in the July, 2012 issue of the European Journal of Cancer. Patients were randomized to real acupuncture or to sham acupuncture. Patients were treated three times per week during the course of radiotherapy. In this study, true acupuncture given concurrently with radiotherapy significantly reduced xerostomia symptoms and improved patients’ quality of life when compared with sham acupuncture.

Cancer patients also suffer from overall quality-of-life and mental health issues. The following prospective clinical trial investigated the effects of acupuncture as palliative therapy for advanced ovarian or breast cancer patients. It was published in the June, 2010 issue of Integrative Cancer Therapies. Researchers assessed the effects of administering acupuncture to patients with advanced ovarian or breast cancer in regard to patients’ subjective experience of their symptoms and quality of life. The study showed significant improvement in anxiety, fatigue, pain, and depression immediately after treatment, and significant improvement over time for patients with anxiety and depression. This pilot study not only demonstrated that acupuncture produces measurable benefits, but researchers also concluded that acupuncture is underutilized as an adjunct cancer therapy.

An Italian study was conducted in Milan to evaluate the efficacy of acupressure for insomnia. Acupressure involves using the same pattern diagnosis and acupuncture points as acupuncture, but stimulation of acupoints is delivered by finger pressure rather than by inserting needles. Of twenty-five study patients with sleep disorders, fourteen of them had cancer. They were treated with acupressure for at least two consecutive weeks. A 60% overall improvement in the quality of sleep was noted for the 25 patients, and an even higher improvement rate of 79% was noted for the cancer patients. This study confirms previous clinical data showing the efficacy of acupressure in the treatment of sleep disorders, particularly in cancer-related insomnia. 

From Dr. Changzhen Gong's keynote speech to the Intercultural Collegiate Cancer Conference: Understanding Health Disparities and Making Connections on March 21, 2014.