Integrative Chinese and Western Medicine for Colorectal Cancer: A Nationwide Prospective Cohort Study

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a common malignant tumor. The global cancer data in 2020 shows that the incidence rate of CRC ranks the third in the world, and the mortality rate ranks the second in the world. China is a large country of CRC. In 2016, China's incidence rate of CRC ranked second in malignant tumors, and its mortality ranked fourth. Both incidence rate and mortality are on the rise. At present, studies have shown that TCM plays an important role in the prevention and treatment of precancerous lesions, recurrence, and metastasis of CRC throughout the entire process. However, the clinical efficacy and mechanism of TCM intervention in the onset, progression, and metastasis of CRC still need further research evidence to support. This project aims to address the above issues, based on the advantages of TCM in tumor prevention and treatment, and actively construct the first large-scale integrated traditional Chinese and Western medicine CRC specialized disease queue in China. The study focuses on the key links of the "precancerous lesions, recurrence, and metastasis" progress of CRC and conducts a combination of disease and syndrome queue research. The project is based on the team's preliminary research results and collaborates with multiple regional diagnosis and treatment centers in China to form high-quality evidence-based medical evidence and unify TCM syndrome differentiation standards for CRC. At the same time, based on the study of specialized disease cohorts, the project breaks through the phenotype omics of TCM, further revealing the biological connotation of TCM syndromes in colorectal cancer, achieving the integration of Chinese and Western medicine, breaking through the bottleneck of basic research on CRC in TCM, assisting the research process of traditional Chinese medicine in preventing and treating CRC, and promoting the modernization of TCM.