Use of Chinese medicine by cancer patients: a review of surveys

Review Bridget Carmady and Caroline A Smith

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Chinese Medicine 2011, 6:22?doi:10.1186/1749-8546-6-22

Published: 9 June 2011

Chinese medicine has been used to treat a variety of cancer-related conditions. This study aims to examine the prevalence and patterns of Chinese medicine usage by cancer patients. We reviewed articles written in English and found only the Chinese medicine usage from the studies on complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). Seventy four (74) out of 81 articles reported rates of CAM usage ranging from 2.6 to 100%. Acupuncture was reported in 71 out of 81 studies. Other less commonly reported modalities included Qigong (n=17), Chinese herbal medicine (n=11), Taichi (n=10), acupressure (n=6), moxibustion (n=2), Chinese dietary therapy (n=1), Chinese massage (n=1), cupping (n=1) and other Chinese medicine modalities (n=19). This review also found important limitations of the English language articles on CAM usage in cancer patients. Our results show that Chinese medicine, in particular Chinese herbal medicine, is commonly used by cancer patients. Further research is warranted to include studies not written in English.

Privately insured heart patients had best outcomes (Reuters)

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Patients who had heart valve replacement surgery who were privately insured had better medical outcomes than the uninsured and Medicaid patients undergoing the same procedure, researchers said on Friday.

As a result, the type of primary insurance should be considered an independent risk factor as patients and doctors weigh risks for surgery, they concluded.

The study, published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, found that uninsured and Medicaid status independently increased the risk of in-hospital mortality and the likelihood of complications after the surgery. This was true even after accounting for socioeconomic status, hospital-related and other factors associated with low-income patient groups, they said.

In addition, Medicaid patients accrued the longest average hospital stay and highest total costs.

"The study findings indicate that primary payer status should be considered as an independent risk factor during preoperative patient risk evaluation," said the study's lead author, Dr. Damien LaPar of the University of Virginia Health System.

From 2007 to 2008, the number of uninsured Americans rose by 600,000. Patients covered by Medicaid and Medicare, the U.S. government assistance insurance programs, increased by 4.4 million, while the number of Americans covered by private health insurance fell by 1 million.

Previous research has shown that Medicaid and uninsured patients have worse outcomes than privately insured patients after medical admissions.

While there have been studies on insurance status as a predictor of disease and the differences in allocation of surgical treatment as a function of the type of insurance a patient has, no study has fully examined the impact of the type of insurance on patients undergoing cardiac valve procedures, nor have they been evaluated in a national database, researchers noted.

The study examined 477,932 patients undergoing heart valve operations over a six-year period using discharge data from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample database.

Patients in each payer group had different income and risk factors. After adjusting for risk factors, the type of insurance a patient had remained a highly significant predictor of mortality, they said.

(Reporting by Debra Sherman, editing by Matthew Lewis)

Indiana Planned Parenthood to drop Medicaid patients (Reuters)

INDIANAPOLIS (Reuters) – Planned Parenthood of Indiana will stop seeing Medicaid patients after Monday because of an Indiana law that cut the provider's funding.

PPIN went to court last month to prevent Indiana from cutting funding to the state's largest reproductive health care provider. U. S. District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt said she would make a decision on whether to enjoin the law by July 1.

"Our 9,300 Medicaid patients, including those who had appointments Tuesday, are going to see their care disrupted," Betty Cockrum, president and CEO of PPIN, said in a statement.

The Medicaid funds stopped May 11, the day Republican Governor Mitch Daniels signed a law that restricts abortions and cuts federal funding to Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood performs abortions, but even before the Indiana law passed, federal money could not be used to pay for abortions. Indiana cut Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood that covers other reproductive health services, including contraception and cancer screening.

After Monday, PPIN said it will have run out of the donations it used to pay for existing Medicaid patients after the bill made national news.

Medicaid patients won't be seen starting Tuesday unless they can pay, two disease intervention specialists will be laid off, and most employees around the state will be taking a day off without pay on Wednesday, according to a statement from

PPIN.

If the judge doesn't make a favorable ruling by July 1, PPIN said it will start closing health centers and reducing staff.

The state has until June 24 to respond to a brief filed last Friday by the federal government that sides with PPIN.

The state is working on its response and will meet its deadline, according to the attorney general's office.

"The case was fully briefed until the U. S. government late Thursday filed its statement of interest, thus necessitating a thorough and thoughtful response from the state," said Bryan Corbin, spokesman for the Indiana Attorney General's office.

North Carolina and Kansas have also restricted funding to Planned Parenthood, but their actions do not affect payments from the federal Medicaid program. Indiana blocks both state and federal payments.

(Editing by Mary Wisniewski and Jerry Norton)