A Small Formula for Relieving Cancer Fever

This is a formula recorded under the entry on Dan Douchi (Fermented Soybean) in Professor Zhang Tingmo's Chinese Materia Medica for Clinical Practice. I have not personally used it in the clinic and cannot judge its actual efficacy; I hope readers who have used it will exchange views with me. I republish it here for reference by those with cancer fever.

Dan Douchi (Fermented Soybean) 15 g, Digupi (Cortex Lycii, root bark of Lycium chinense) 15 g, Jiao Shanzhi (charcoal-fried Gardenia) 5 g, Chaihu (Radix Bupleuri) 12 g, Baiwei (Radix Cynanchi Atrati) 30 g. Decoct in water; two weeks constitute one treatment course. It is said to have a good effect in abating cancer fever.

This formula is delicately composed. Although I have not used it clinically, I feel it should have some efficacy. Dan Douchi, Digupi, Jiao Shanzhi, Chaihu, and Baiwei respectively clear heat, promote sweating, vent rashes, dissipate steaming bone disorder, and drain fire. Yet their medicinal natures are all relatively mild. Combined together, they provide comprehensive, targeted treatment of cancer fever.

However, my own therapeutic experience is to begin preventing cancer fever before it appears. Almost none of the cancer patients I have treated have developed cancer fever. This is a preventive anti-cancer-fever therapy I created by modeling myself on the "twisting and intercepting therapy" of the late renowned Shanghai TCM professor Jiang Chunhua. This approach also embodies the TCM idea of "treating disease before it arises" (zhi wei bing). Treating disease before it arises can also mean, when the patient is already ill, predicting in advance the symptoms that will further develop and treating them prophylactically.

The Dan Douchi in this formula must be prepared according to TCM processing methods to be effective. A Taoist priest who is quite knowledgeable about medicinal materials once told me that much of the Dan Douchi sold in pharmacies and hospitals today is crudely made without following TCM processing methods. As for the fermented soybean one buys for cooking, it cannot be used as the Chinese medicinal Dan Douchi.

There are two processing methods for medicinal Dan Douchi. One is processed with Qinghao (Herba Artemisiae Annuae) and Sangye (Folium Mori) as adjuvants; it is bitter and pungent in flavor and cool in nature. The other is processed with Mahuang (Herba Ephedrae) and Suye (Folium Perillae) as adjuvants; it is pungent and bitter in flavor and slightly warm in nature. Both can disperse exterior pathogens and diffuse constrained heat. But one is slightly cool and the other slightly warm, so there is a slight difference. However, Dan Douchi is often used only as an auxiliary herb, so in actual clinical practice this distinction can be ignored.