title: Exploring the medication duration based on the effect of traditional Chinese medicine on postoperative stage I-III colorectal patients: a retrospective cohort study.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To clarify the effect of tradional Chinese medicine (TCM) on different stage patients and to explore medication duration based on survival analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  523 and 294 patients were respectively in the TCM group and the control group. For all patients, 6-year disease-free survival (DFS) was 57.6% after TCM and 46.6% after non-TCM (p = 0.0006). 6-year DFS for patients with stage I disease in the TCM group was 79.5% compared with 89.1% in the control group (p = 0.65). For patients with stage II disease, 6-year DFS was 63.1% in the TCM group compared with 50.2% in the control group (p = 0.054), and for patients with stage III disease, it was 43.3% in the TCM group compared with 22.0% in the control group (p = 0.0000).
  
  
  METHODS
  Data for patients with stage I-III disease between 2004 and 2013 were retrieved for this study, who underwent TCM after surgery were in the TCM group and the others were in the control group. Clinic appointments or phone were used to collect data by research assistants. Survival data were collected on Nov 2015 from the database, which is continuously updated by the researchers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  TCM is associated with significantly improved disease-free survival, in particular for patients with stage III disease. Among of these, TCM is not necessary for patients with stage I disease, and postoperative patients with stage II disease should be recommended to take 2 years of TCM. For patients with stage III disease, adherence to medication of TCM during the 6-year follow-up is worthy of being recommended.
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Qi
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Shanshan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Wen
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Shaoqi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zong
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Susu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Hongjia
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Oncology Department of Municipal Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200071, China.
authors.forename: Fenggang
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Hou
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D015331:Cohort Studies; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality / Q000628:therapy*; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D008516:Medicine, Chinese Traditional / Q000379:methods*; D008875:Middle Aged; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D016896:Treatment Outcome
keywords: colorectal cancer; medication duration; traditional Chinese medicine