Is Traditional Chinese Medicine “Mainstream” in China? Trends in Traditional Chinese Medicine Health Resources and Their Utilization in Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospitals from 2004 to 2016
Joint Authors
Nicholas, Stephen
Shi, Xuefeng
Zhu, Dawei
Hong, Baolin
Man, Xiaowei
He, Ping
Source
Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine
Issue
Vol. 2020, Issue 2020 (31 Dec. 2020), pp.1-8, 8 p.
Publisher
Hindawi Publishing Corporation
Publication Date
2020-05-31
Country of Publication
Egypt
No. of Pages
8
Main Subjects
Abstract EN
Background.
Traditional, complementary, and alternative medicine (TCAM) has attracted increasing attention in developed countries, but its mainstream status in China, the home of TCAM, is unclear.
Over the period of 2004–2016, we analyze the health resources and health resource utilization of traditional medicine in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) hospitals in China.
Methods.
Over 2004–2016, we obtained data from all TCM hospitals in all Chinese provinces to create a hospital-based, longitudinal dataset.
TCM health resources and their utilization were measured by two outcome variables: (1) primary outcome variables comprising the proportion of TCM physicians, TCM pharmacists, revenue from TCM drugs, and TCM prescriptions and (2) the secondary outcome variables, as proxies of westernization for TCM hospitals, comprising the number of medical equipment above RMB 10,000 and the proportion of surgery in inpatient visits.
We used linear regression models with hospital-fixed effects to analyze time trends for the outcome variables.
Results.
The number of public TCM hospitals remained stable from 2004 to 2016, while the number of private TCM hospitals increased from 294 in 2004 to 1560 in 2016.
There was a small percentage increase in the proportion of TCM physicians (0.280%), TCM pharmacists (0.298%), and revenue from Chinese medicines (0.331%) and TCM prescriptions (1.613%) per hospital per year.
Chinese drugs accounted for less than a half of the total drug prescriptions, and accordingly, just one-third of the drug revenue was from Chinese medicines at TCM hospitals.
The proportions of physicians, pharmacists, revenue from Chinese drug sales, and traditional medicine prescriptions never reach the 60% benchmark target for mainstream in TCM hospitals.
As proxies for Western medicine practices in TCM hospitals, the number of medical equipment above RMB 10,000 rapidly rose by over 13 percent per hospital per year, but the proportion of inpatient surgeries declined by 0.830 percentage points per hospital per year, reflecting a mixed trend in the use of Western medicine practices.
Conclusion.
For the 2004–2016 period, traditional medicine, although making progress towards the mainstream benchmark of 60% TCM services, was still not mainstream at TCM hospitals.
American Psychological Association (APA)
Shi, Xuefeng& Zhu, Dawei& Nicholas, Stephen& Hong, Baolin& Man, Xiaowei& He, Ping. 2020. Is Traditional Chinese Medicine “Mainstream” in China? Trends in Traditional Chinese Medicine Health Resources and Their Utilization in Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospitals from 2004 to 2016. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine،Vol. 2020, no. 2020, pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1158457
Modern Language Association (MLA)
Shi, Xuefeng…[et al.]. Is Traditional Chinese Medicine “Mainstream” in China? Trends in Traditional Chinese Medicine Health Resources and Their Utilization in Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospitals from 2004 to 2016. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine No. 2020 (2020), pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1158457
American Medical Association (AMA)
Shi, Xuefeng& Zhu, Dawei& Nicholas, Stephen& Hong, Baolin& Man, Xiaowei& He, Ping. Is Traditional Chinese Medicine “Mainstream” in China? Trends in Traditional Chinese Medicine Health Resources and Their Utilization in Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospitals from 2004 to 2016. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine. 2020. Vol. 2020, no. 2020, pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1158457
Data Type
Journal Articles
Language
English
Notes
Includes bibliographical references
Record ID
BIM-1158457