Anhui: COVID-19 Patients Lost No Time in Taking Chinese Medicine Decoction
2020-02-17

In order to give full play to the advantages of TCM and strive to improve the recovery rate and reduce the mortality rate, on Feb 12th, the Health Commission of Anhui Province issued Urgent Notice on Further Implementing Integrated TCM and Western Medicine Treatment of COVID-19, requiring that TCM should be deeply involved in the whole process and achieve full coverage of integrated TCM and western medicine treatment.

With regard to the implementation of the full coverage of integrated TCM and western medicine treatment, the Notice requires that COVID-19 patients (including confirmed and suspected patients, the same below) admitted to designated hospitals should take TCM decoctions as soon as possible.
 "Qingfei Detox Decoction", recommended by National Health Commission and National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine should be used to treat patients with mild, moderate and severe symptoms, and rationally and dialectically used on critical patients by taking their actual conditions into consideration and achieve the goal of “one person, one prescription”.

Based on the counterpart guidance of the provincial TCM expert team, TCM treatment teams will be dispatched to 28 designated hospitals in the province and its cities. The dispatch of TCM experts at designated county-level hospitals is the responsibility of Municipal Health Commission. TCM workers in designated hospitals can be included in the TCM treatment team, which will participate in the treatment of patients at designated hospitals throughout the process, including making rounds, consultations and case discussions, etc., and be responsible for the evaluation and daily report of the TCM treatment.

In order to ensure the quality of TCM decoctions, designated TCM hospitals will uniformly produce and distribute the decoctions for 28 designated hospitals. The decoctions required by county-level designated hospitals will be arranged by the municipal health commission.

Anhui will also set up a high-level expert team for TCM prevention and control of COVID-19, led by National TCM masters and famous TCM doctors. The team will be responsible for the treatment of severe patients, clinical guidance of the “one person, one prescription” for critical patients, organizing consultations and discussions of complicated cases and emergency research on TCM diagnosis and treatment, carrying out summary and assessment, and improving clinical efficacy.

At the same time, the designated hospitals aim to improve the recovery rate and reduce the mortality rate, to provide the necessary convenience for the integrated TCM and western medicine treatment, and to effectively provide logistic support including the protective materials for TCM team. TCM hospitals at all levels must go all out to ensure personnel deployment and the distribution of TCM decoctions.