Lessons from a Lung Adenocarcinoma Patient Who Survived 15 Years

This is a female rural patient from Jinzhou, Liaoning Province, surnamed Wang, born in 1949. She is Manchu, farms in a village near Jinzhou, is married, and has one daughter.

The patient was found to have lung adenocarcinoma in 2004 and underwent resection of the upper lobe of the left lung. Postoperative pathology showed "central-type, well-differentiated adenocarcinoma."

In 2009, follow-up examination found recurrence and metastasis. Thereafter the patient refused Western treatment and continually sought TCM help, seeing several TCM practitioners; one of them controlled her condition quite well.

Unfortunately, that doctor later left the hospital due to a job transfer, and the patient lost contact. She then changed doctors, but the results were not obvious.

By 2016 her disease had progressed rapidly. There were many pulmonary lesions, the largest about 5 cm, progressing fast, accompanied by liver cysts and nodules; after taking a secret folk formula from an itinerant doctor, she developed severe ulcers in the digestive tract.

On August 24, 2016, the patient and her husband came to Beijing together to seek my treatment. At the in-person visit, because of the medicine she had taken, she had severe ulcers in the mouth, tongue, esophagus, and stomach; her mouth felt burning, and eating was greatly affected.

At the time I found her right pulse wiry and rolling, left pulse deep and thin, with severe oral ulcers. I prescribed:

Chaihu 10, Huangqin 10, Wuweizi 15, Dangshen 20, Chao Baizhu 20, Fuling 20, Baishao 20, Sheng Gancao 15, Zhongjiefeng 30, Kushen 20, Baiji 20, Suanzaoren 30, Danshen 20, Ezhu 6, Banzhilian 20, Baihuasheshecao 20, Sangbaipi 10, Dannangxing 10, Sanleng 6, Jianghuang 6, Jiangcan 10, Chantui 6, Jiao Sanxian each 10, Sheng Huangqi 20.

Anti-cancer patent medicines: Xihuang Wan, once daily, dose increased day by day—3–6–9–12–12.

Xiaojin Wan, once daily, dose increased day by day—1.5–3–4.5–6–6.

Fufang Banmao Jiaonang (Compound Cantharides Capsules).

For oral ulcers, Licorzinc Granules (Gancao Xin Keli).

On September 1, the patient's husband added that she had occasional dry cough. I had her add 30g of raw gypsum, decocted first, to the above formula for three days to see whether there was change; after three days the dry cough had slightly lessened.

I then had her add 30g raw gypsum and 6g Zhimu to the original formula. After five days, the frequency and severity of the dry cough decreased, and the ulcer pain, swelling, and swallowing difficulty also lessened. I told her to continue this regimen.

After two months of medication, CT showed that all lesions had been brought under control; the couple decided to continue. Thereafter the patient developed various symptoms from time to time—either returning for follow-up or having me adjust the prescription remotely. Her family reported on her condition every few days. Her condition gradually eased.

In 2017 her condition rebounded and Chinese medicine could not control it, so I suggested she take the Indian version of Iressa (gefitinib). After starting Iressa, the tumor briefly shrank, but resistance soon developed, the tumor rebounded, and the pulmonary and liver metastases grew rapidly—several centimeters in a month.

Her husband asked me to prescribe again. At that time I had just developed my own Shanchan Wan (Mountain Toad Pill), a pill formula with good effect on lung cancer; it had achieved good results in several lung cancer patients, so I had her take my pill together with Iressa to see.

After three months of medication—as I write this article today—the pulmonary lesions have stopped growing and the liver lesions have shrunk.

From recurrence and metastasis to now, ten years have passed. Because the couple rejected continued Western treatment, she has stuck only to TCM; the targeted drug was taken only after my insistence. As a middle-to-late-stage lung cancer patient with recurrence and metastasis, both the length and quality of her survival are enviable.

All these years she has run the household at home, and her physical condition is very good. An important reason her disease progressed rapidly last year was that her daughter was diagnosed with a brain tumor; this was a heavy blow, leaving her in poor spirits, anxious day and night, so the disease progressed fast.

Between oncologists and cancer patients, because they spend so long together, they often end up as close friends. I have dealt with this family for two years, so I understand her survival experience well; by now I basically see why she has lived so long.

First, this patient's family is very harmonious, especially the loving relationship between husband and wife. The patient herself is illiterate; her husband can read but is not highly educated.

The old couple rely on each other; the husband cares deeply for his wife. Though rural elders do not put "love" on their lips the way young urban people do, over the years he has taken his wife everywhere seeking treatment, and the money from selling the grain they grew all went to her medical care, with no complaints. From this alone, this uncle is a man of deep feeling and loyalty.

The patient, for her part, trusts her husband completely. She knows she is illiterate and knows little of the outside world, so she leaves all treatment decisions to him. She told me herself that whatever her husband tells her to do, she does it without a second thought.

The old couple never quarrel; theirs is a truly traditional "husband leads, wife follows" relationship. I have seen a large number of cancer patients and many couples coming together for treatment; some couples quarrel so badly that the patient has to divorce their spouse during treatment.

Personally, I believe that with such a serious illness, only patients from harmonious families can find a way to survive. Couples who come to me sometimes start arguing right in front of me.

Everyone talks about what a happy or unhappy marriage is, and there is a lot of nonsense. But from what I see, unhappy marriages basically follow one pattern: the spouses are used to blaming each other in daily life.

The way for husband and wife to get along lies in both sides having the spirit of self-reflection. If one only sees the other's faults and blames relentlessly, escalating to quarrels and fights, such a family environment only adds frost to snow; the disease will surely be hard to cure.

Moreover, the fortitude of this family has my deepest admiration. After the patient's daughter was diagnosed with a brain tumor, I felt deeply for this family. I not only waived their consultation fees but gave them the medicine free. Besides my own medicines, I also passed on targeted drugs that other lung cancer patients' families had asked me to give to other patients after their relatives died.

The family always refused at first, but in the end, unable to resist my insistence, they accepted.

Yet when I personally donated money to them and raised funds among my friends, they refused to take a cent and returned it all.

The pillar of this household is the uncle, nearly seventy, who by sheer strength of will bears the family's expenses—though he himself is actually also a patient.

These two years I have been like their family doctor. Although I no longer charge consultation or medication fees, I have taken part in treating the illnesses of all three of them. The medicine I can give is after all limited; they still need to spend a great deal on other drugs. Their attitude of gritting their teeth and managing on their own, without asking for help, deeply moves me.

People in my Moments are often using crowdfunding platforms to raise hundreds of thousands or millions; most of those families are far better off than this one, yet the members of this family have such a spirit of self-reliance, which I greatly admire.

It is precisely this self-reliant spirit and the harmonious family atmosphere that have allowed this lung cancer patient to survive so many years.

From the first moment I met this couple, I was struck by their courtesy. The old couple treat people sincerely and kindly. When they first came to me, I had just left the hospital and had not yet rented my own place; I could only take their pulses in a hotel lobby. Yet these two elders showed not the slightest disrespect or distrust.

I think the reason we have gotten along so long, and why I have become their "family doctor," is also tied to the mutual trust and respect we had from the start.

As a physician, my purpose in studying medicine is to heal the wounded and rescue the dying, so not only do patients need doctors, but we doctors also need patients. Yet in actual practice, I often have to guard against attacks from patients and families; patients to whom I can give my whole heart, treating them carefully, without regard for reward and with no lingering fears, are actually few.

Because I am young, I often meet patients or family members full of suspicion, some even rude to me. Generally, once we physicians encounter such people, we immediately go on guard and shift into self-protective treatment—"seek no merit, avoid no blame."

Of course, these days I am more straightforward: I usually tell such patients to seek someone more skillful, so as not to waste their time or money.

Illness must be treated; relying on self-healing is not impossible, but the hope is too slim. So patient and doctor are naturally on the same side. If doctor and patient have empathy and can put themselves in each other's shoes, treatment goes much more smoothly.

I believe this couple was just as simple and honest with previous doctors, so those doctors also gave their all, which is why the patient has survived to this day.

Be a decent person; do not suspect others of ill intent. It can bring many unexpected rewards. If a family gets to the point where others dread dealing with them, that is a failure.

On the other hand, after illness, family support and a good mindset are also important guarantees of recovery. If someone is ill and family relations are tense, with family not supporting but instead always making the patient unhappy, then the problem is very hard to solve.

This patient knew her diagnosis from the start but was not cowed by the word "cancer." Granted, part of it is her own good attitude, but one cannot deny that her family also put a great deal into emotional support, allowing her to be so at peace.

These are actually simple truths, but it is regrettable that in all my years of practice I have not met many families as admirable as this one. That is why so many patients wealthier than them have far shorter survival.

In treating them, I have also learned a great deal from them.