Experience Using Chai Guang Jiedu Wan, with Poison-Fighting Toxics, for Leukemia
Chai Guang Jiedu Wan is a compound I devised during the 2022 COVID epidemic to relieve post-COVID symptoms; I have already published the formula on my official account and personal website. During the epidemic it relieved symptoms in many patients; after COVID ended, some readers prepared the pills themselves from my published formula to treat family members' colds, with good results. Some patients' family members developed eczema after COVID that resisted many treatments and was finally resolved by Chai Guang Jiedu Wan, which surprised even me. For the rationale behind Chai Guang Jiedu Wan, see my earlier article "My Pill Formula for Treating COVID, Chai Guang Jiedu Wan."
But what surprised me most was that this pill, by happy accident, also helped a patient with chronic myeloid leukemia. The patient was an elderly woman in her seventies; before falling ill she had done chemistry research at a chemical research institute, and her disease may be related to long-term chemical exposure. After contracting COVID in November 2022 she became seriously ill; because of the severe medical crunch at the time, she had to treat herself with the Chai Guang Jiedu Wan formula I had published. Her condition was rapidly brought under control, and at the same time, the enlarged lymph nodes caused by her leukemia unexpectedly shrank.
The formula she used was as follows: guizhi (Cinnamomi Ramulus) 10 g, huangqin (Scutellariae Radix) 10 g, renshen (Ginseng) 10 g, zhigancao (honey-fried Licorice) 6 g, baishao (White Peony) 10 g, chaihu (Bupleuri Radix) 25 g, tianhuafen (Trichosanthes Root) 15 g, huoxiang (Agastachis Herba) 5 g, peilan (Eupatorii Herba) 5 g, sharen (Amomi Fructus) 5 g, qianghuo (Notopterygii Rhizoma) 10 g, chuanxiong (Chuanxiong Rhizoma) 5 g, cangzhu (Atractylodis Rhizoma) 5 g, houpo (Magnoliae Cortex) 5 g, zhiqiao (Aurantii Fructus) 5 g, baizhi (Angelicae Dahuricae Radix) 5 g, manjingzi (Viticis Fructus) 15 g, fangfeng (Saposhnikoviae Radix) 5 g, jingjie (Schizonepetae Herba) 5 g, pipaye (Eriobotryae Folium) 10 g, sangbaipi (Mori Cortex) 15 g, jineijin (Galli Gigerii Endothelium Corneum) 6 g, shanzha (Crataegi Fructus) 15 g, gegen (Puerariae Radix) 15 g, jiegeng (Platycodi Radix) 10 g, dilong (Pheretima) 10 g, dazao (Jujubae Fructus, flesh) 25 g, and ganjiang (Zingiberis Rhizoma) 5 g. The herbs are ground into a powder and made into soybean-sized pills; take 20–30 pills each time.
Afterward, analyzing together with this patient, I felt the result was both unexpected and not. For the Chai Guang Jiedu Wan I devised combines several classical TCM formulas—Chaihu Guizhi Tang, Jingfang Baidu San, Xiebai San and Ping Wei Wan—modified according to some clinical features of COVID infection. The formula has good anti-infective action and also anti-tumor action.
An important pathological feature of all types of leukemia is that the patient's immunity is low, they are prone to infection, and once infected the disease progresses rapidly. So it stands to reason that an anti-infective formula like Chai Guang Jiedu Wan would have some effect on leukemia.
By this year, the patient taking Chai Guang Jiedu Wan could no longer control her rising white blood cells, so I added, on top of the formula, poison-fighting-toxin herbs such as wugong (Scolopendra), quanxie (Scorpio), bihu (Gecko), chansu (Bufonis Venenum) and baihuashe (Agkistrodon); after adding them, her white-cell count stabilized. The most frightening thing in leukemia is the white count climbing without end; stabilizing it means extending the patient's life.
These added herbs are all TCM "fighting poison with poison" agents. Why can they stabilize the white count? I previously wrote an article, "The 'Fighting Poison with Poison' That Is Not as Simple as It Sounds," in which, drawing on the research of modern toxicologists, I explained that the root principle of fighting poison with poison is that biological toxins continuously raise the body's immunity. Western toxicologists have researched this deeply and produced a series of results; the mechanism of the TCM poison-fighting toxins is basically the same.
So the efficacy this change brought the patient was no accident. The patient met me last weekend, and we discussed the principle behind her treatment. Because she herself is a research scientist, the scientific rationale behind this approach was not hard for her to understand, so we explored together how best to apply this idea—combining anti-infection with immunity-boosting—to her, to achieve further therapeutic effect.
I believe the principle by which TCM compound formulas act against leukemia and tumors can certainly be explained by modern science. Though we still lack such research and scientific explanation, I believe that in future, as more and more people study the action of Chinese medicine in this direction, we will find better, more scientifically reasoned TCM approaches to treating cancer-type diseases, with more reliable efficacy.