Advances in the Application of Traditional Chinese Medicine Using Artificial Intelligence: A Review

Abstract

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), as one of the crystallizations of Chinese wisdom, emphasizes the balance of Yin and Yang to keep the body healthy. Under the theoretical guidance of a holistic view, the diagnostic process in TCM has characteristics of subjectivity, fuzziness, and complexity. Therefore, realizing standardization and achieving objective quantitative analysis are the bottlenecks of the development of TCM. The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) technology has brought unprecedented challenges and opportunities to traditional medicine, which is expected to provide objective measurements and improve the clinical efficacy. However, the combination of TCM and AI is still in its infancy and currently faces many challenges. Therefore, this review provides a comprehensive discussion of the existing advances, problems, and prospects of the applications of AI technologies in TCM with the hope of promoting a better understanding of the TCM modernization and intellectualization.

Keywords: Artificial Intelligence; Decision Support; Knowledge Discovering; Pattern Recognition; Review; Traditional Chinese Medicine.