Discovery of regularities in the use of herbs in traditional Chinese medicine prescriptions

Abstract

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a discipline with its own distinct methodologies and philosophical principles. The main method of treatment in TCM is to use herb prescriptions. Typically, a number of herbs are combined to form a formula and different formulae are prescribed for different patients. Regularities on the mixture of herbs in the prescriptions are important for both clinical treatment and novel patent medicine development. In this study, we analyze TCM formula data using latent tree (LT) models. Interesting regularities are discovered. Those regularities are of interest to students of TCM as well as pharmaceutical companies that manufacture medicine using Chinese herbs. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.