Changes of Anti-tuberculosis Herbs Formula During Past Three Decades in Contrast to Ancient Ones

Objective: To investigate the evolution of herbal medicine in treating tuberculosis (TB) and encourage anti-TB drug discovery and development.

Methods: In this study, 477 ancient traditional Chinese medicine formulae were collected from the Dictionary of Traditional Chinese Medicine Prescriptions and 172 modern Chinese medicine formulae (from 1986 to 2016) were collected by searching 4 databases: WanFang Data Knowledge Service Platform, China National Knowledge Infrastructure Database (CNKI), China Science and Technology Journal Database (VIP) and Chinese Bio-medical Literature and Retrieval System (SinoMed) in Chinese. We restricted the search to publications in Chinese. Further data analysis was done using the Traditional Chinese Medicine Inheritance Support System version 2 Software.

Results: There were 425 herbs in the 477 ancient formulae and 257 herbs in the 172 modern formulae. Half of the top 30 herbs were shared by both modern and ancient prescriptions. They are Radix Ophiopogonis, Astragalus membranaceus, Fritillaria cirrhosa, Dried rehmannia glutinosa, Poria cocos, Angelica sinensis, Prepared rehmannia glutinosa, Platycodon Root, Radix paeoniae alba, Schisandra chinensis, Bighead atractylodes rhizome, Rhizoma anemarrhenae, Cortex lycii radicis and Radix Scutellariae. Only two groups of herbs with a high correlation coefficient were found in both modern and ancient prescriptions, the Dried rehmannia glutinosa with Radix ophiopogonis, and Radix ophiopogonis with Prepared rehmannia glutinosa. There were 9 and 15 core herb combinations in modern and ancient prescriptions, respectively, but no one was found simutaniously in both modern and ancient prescriptions.

Conclusions: Although there were wide variations in the herb groups and herb combinations in the formulae, half of the top 30 herbs were found in both modern and ancient prescriptions. The core herb combinations in modern and ancient prescriptions could help us to improve the priscription for treatment of TB.

Keywords: Chinese materia medica; anti-tuberculosis berbs; herbal formula; tuberculosis.