Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39996900›Full record

ArticleCurrent oncology (Toronto, Ont.)2025

Trends in Kampo Medicine Usage as Supportive Care During Anticancer Drug Treatment in Japanese Patients: A Nationwide Cohort Analysis from Fiscal Years 2015 to 2021.

Hiroaki Ohta, Takeo Yasu

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Current oncology (Toronto, Ont.), 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

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Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Hiroaki OhtaDepartment of Medicinal Therapy Research, Education and Research Unit for Comprehensive Clinical Pharmacy, Meiji Pharmaceutical University, Tokyo 204-8588, Japan.
Takeo YasuDepartment of Medicinal Therapy Research, Education and Research Unit for Comprehensive Clinical Pharmacy, Meiji Pharmaceutical University, Tokyo 204-8588, Japan.ORCID 0000-0003-0587-0091

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The adverse effects of anticancer drugs significantly impact the quality of life of patients undergoing chemotherapy, necessitating evidence-based supportive therapies. In Japan, Kampo medicines, traditional Japanese herbal therapies used for relief of various symptoms, have been widely used as complementary and alternative treatments for cancer, despite limited evidence regarding their efficacy and safety. Thus, we investigated the actual use of Kampo medicines as supportive care in patients undergoing anticancer drug treatment and evaluated the trends in prescription according to year. We analyzed 89,141 cancer drug therapy cases registered in the Japan Medical Data Center database between April 2014 and July 2022, excluding those with a history of Kampo medicine prescriptions before the first prescription of antineoplastic drugs. We assessed the trends in prescription according to sex, age group (<50, 50-74, and ≥75 years), and cancer type subgroup using the Cochran-Armitage trend test. Approximately 23.7% of patients were prescribed Kampo medicines during anticancer drug treatment. Since 2014, a decrease in the prescription of Kampo medicines during anticancer treatment has been observed regardless of sex, age, or cancer type. These findings suggest that recent negative reports on the efficacy and safety of Kampo medicines in cancer care may have influenced this trend.

Indexed as

Antineoplastic AgentsMedicine, KampoNeoplasmsAgedCohort StudiesEast Asian PeopleFemaleHumansJapanMaleMiddle AgedAntineoplastic Agentsanticancer drugcomplementary and alternative medicineherbal medicineKampo medicinetrend

Identifiers

PMID39996900
PMCPMC11854802

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.