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. 2021 Dec 26:2021:4441192.
doi: 10.1155/2021/4441192. eCollection 2021.

A Perspective on Tongue Diagnosis in Patients with Breast Cancer

Po-Chi Hsu  1   2 , Han-Kuei Wu  2   3 , Hen-Hong Chang  3   4 , Jia-Ming Chen  5 , John Y Chiang  6   7 , Lun-Chien Lo  1   4
Affiliations

A Perspective on Tongue Diagnosis in Patients with Breast Cancer

Po-Chi Hsu et al. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. .

Abstract

Introduction: Breast cancer (BC) is the most common cancer in women and patients with BC often undergo complex treatment. In Taiwan, nearly 80% of patients with BC seek traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) during adjuvant chemotherapy to relieve discomfort and side effects. This study investigated tongue features and pattern differentiation through noninvasive TCM tongue diagnosis in patients with BC.

Materials and methods: This cross-sectional, case-controlled, retrospective observational study collected patient data through a chart review. The tongue features were extracted using the automatic tongue diagnosis system (ATDS). Nine tongue features, including tongue shape, tongue color, fur thickness, fur color, saliva, tongue fissures, ecchymoses, teeth marks, and red dots, were analyzed. Results and Discussion. Objective image analysis techniques were used to identify significant differences in the many tongue features between BC patients and non-BC individuals. A significantly larger proportion of patients with BC had a small tongue (p < 0.001), pale tongue (p < 0.001), thick fur (p < 0.001), yellow fur (p < 0.001), wet saliva (p < 0.001), thick tongue fur (p < 0.001), fissures (p=0.040), and ecchymoses in the heart-lung area (p=0.013). According to logistic regression, small tongue shape, pale tongue color, yellow fur color, wet saliva, and the amounts of fissures were associated with a significantly increased odds ratio for BC.

Conclusions: This study showed significant differences in tongue features, such as small tongue shape, pale tongue color, thick fur, yellow fur color, wet saliva, fissure, and ecchymoses in the heart-lung area in patients with BC. These tongue features would imply yin deficiency, deficiencies of blood, stagnation of heat, and phlegm/blood stasis in TCM theory. There is a need to investigate effective and safe treatment to enhance the role of TCM in integrated medical care for patients with BC.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The exploratory flowchart for breast cancer-associated tongue diagnosis variates.
Figure 2
Figure 2
The processing flow of ATDS analysis.
Figure 3
Figure 3
The tongue is subdivided into areas corresponding to different internal organs by ATDS. A: heart and lung area; B: left liver-gallbladder area; C: right liver-gallbladder area; D: spleen and stomach area; E: kidney area.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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