Chinese Herb Enters Trials to Treat Prostate Cancer

A commonly used herb in Chinese herbal formulae, Huang Bai has entered trials for prostrate cancer at the University of Texas School of Medicine, San Antonio. An article about this can be read here.

Adanki Pratap Kumar, a professor of urology in the University of Texas School of Medicine at the Health Science Center in San Antonio, discovered in his laboratory that there was something special about the extract -- from the bark of the Amur cork tree in China -- in combination with radiation treatments that seemed to make both work much better.

It is not surprising that this ingredient, which is in many of the formulae that we make patients with specific complaints and constititutional issues, would be found useful for issues such as cancer. Traditional Chinese medicine categorizes diseases as having specific traits and prescribes acupuncture points and herbal formulae which balance these traits. Cancer often has characteristics which this ingredient would be useful in treating.