Therapeutic potential of traditional Chinese medicine for the treatment of chemotherapy-induced diarrhea:clinical efficacy and underlying mechanismsOA

Chemotherapy-induced diarrhea(CID)is a major concern for cancer patients and is associated with significant morbidity and mortality.Currently,the clinical management of CID is limited.The utilization of antidiarrheal medications,such as loperamide and octreotide,is relatively limited because of their unsatisfactory efficacy and adverse effects.In recent years,traditional Chinese medicine(TCM)has attracted great interest because of its beneficial effect in treating CID,which has multitarget and low-toxicity therapeutic characteristics.TCM exhibits remarkable therapeutic potential in the prevention and treatment of CID.It can alleviate and treat CID by regulating chemical drug metabolism,improving the integrity of the intestinal barrier,stimulating proliferation while suppressing the apoptosis of intestinal epithelial cells,ameliorating oxidative stress and inflammation and regulating bile acids and aquaporins.However,large-scale,randomized,double-blind clinical trials of TCM for the treatment of CID are lacking,and most preclinical experiments have not been translated to clinical trials.Accordingly,this review highlights the clinical efficacy and molecular mechanisms of TCM against CID via PubMed,Web of Science and China National Knowledge Infrastructure and proposes that future research on TCM against CID should focus on strengthening the connection from bench to bed,which may help to comprehensively evaluate the therapeutic potential of TCM against CID.