Zhang Boli talks about the development of traditional Chinese medicine: using modern technology to explore the great treasure house of traditional Chinese medicine

People's Daily Online, Beijing, May 15 (Reporter Qiao Yeqiong) Traditional Chinese medicine contains the Chinese nation's health and wellness concepts and practical experience for thousands of years. It is a great creation of the Chinese nation and a treasure of ancient Chinese science. How to do a good job in maintaining the integrity and innovation of traditional Chinese medicine, inheriting and developing it, and providing better health services to the people? How to cultivate a team of traditional Chinese medicine talents in the new era? People's Daily Online reporter interviewed Zhang Boli, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and honorary president of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine.

Meeting people's needs for traditional Chinese medicine throughout their life cycle and health

Reporter: The combination of Chinese and Western medicine and the use of both Chinese and Western medicines are a major feature of the prevention and control of the new coronavirus pneumonia epidemic. It is also a vivid practice of inheriting the essence of traditional Chinese medicine and maintaining integrity and innovation. Not only that, traditional Chinese medicine has also played an important role in the prevention and control of major infectious diseases. In promoting supply-side reform in the field of health care, what are the advantages of traditional Chinese medicine?

Zhang Boli: In this fight against the epidemic, traditional Chinese medicine has been involved early and participated throughout the whole process, playing an important role at every stage, becoming a highlight of China's fight against the epidemic. Not only that, traditional Chinese medicine has also played an important role in the prevention and treatment of major diseases, chronic diseases, and geriatric diseases in daily life, and has a definite therapeutic effect.

The State Council's strategic deployment on promoting the inheritance and development of traditional Chinese medicine points out that we must give full play to the leading role of traditional Chinese medicine in preventing diseases, the synergistic role in treating major diseases, and the core role in disease recovery. To give full play to these three advantages and roles, we must focus on the structural reform of the supply side of traditional Chinese medicine, optimize the allocation of factors and the supply of services, promote the optimization and upgrading of traditional Chinese medicine health services, give full play to its unique advantages in the construction of a healthy China, and meet people's demand for traditional Chinese medicine throughout the whole life cycle and health process.

The concept of traditional Chinese medicine is consistent with the development trend of modern medicine

Reporter: You have said before that although traditional Chinese medicine is ancient, its concepts and methods are not backward, and many difficulties and challenges encountered by modern life sciences will be inspired by traditional Chinese medicine. Please share the clinical application results of traditional Chinese medicine with specific cases.

Zhang Boli: Traditional Chinese medicine contains the Chinese nation's health and wellness concepts and practical experience for thousands of years. It is a great creation of the Chinese nation and a treasure of ancient Chinese science. It is also the key to open the treasure house of Chinese civilization. Although traditional Chinese medicine is old, it is not backward in terms of concepts and methodology. For example, the basic theories of traditional Chinese medicine, such as the unity of man and nature, holistic concept, syndrome differentiation and treatment, health care, compound treatment, non-drug therapy, etc., are the same as the development trend of modern medicine. These were proposed more than 2,000 years ago!

To revitalize and develop traditional Chinese medicine, we must boldly learn from and introduce modern science and technology for our own use at the technical level. I said many years ago that combining the original thinking of traditional Chinese medicine with modern technology can produce original results. Inspired by the "Emergency Prescriptions for the Elbow", Tu Youyou led her team to transform an ancient Chinese medicine into a powerful antimalarial drug, saving millions of lives around the world, especially in developing countries, and won the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. This is a successful example of using modern technology to discover the great treasure house of traditional Chinese medicine, and it is also a vivid practice of traditional Chinese medicine's innovation. In recent decades, there have been more and more such cases. In the future, the development of traditional Chinese medicine must be oriented to national needs, clinical problems, and production practices. It must rely on innovation-driven development to "inherit, develop, and utilize" the great treasure house of traditional Chinese medicine and make new contributions to the construction of a healthy China.

The key to TCM going global is the recognition of TCM culture and thinking

Reporter: Now my country's traditional medicine treatment concepts are gradually being accepted by the world, and the demand for Chinese medicine is also growing worldwide. What are the key difficulties that need to be overcome in order to promote the international development of Chinese medicine?

Zhang Boli: At present, traditional Chinese medicine has spread to 183 countries and regions around the world, playing a positive role in meeting diversified health needs. But this is still not enough, and there are still some barriers that need to be broken through for traditional Chinese medicine to go global.

The first thing that TCM needs to go global is its efficacy. Although there is a lot of evidence of effectiveness, there are still relatively few high-quality studies. We need to further strengthen research and produce high-level evidence. Secondly, there are large differences between Chinese and Western cultures. The key to TCM going global is the recognition of TCM culture and thinking. TCM emphasizes holistic concepts and syndrome differentiation and treatment, and has the characteristics of multiple targets, which need to be further recognized by the world. The third is to improve the quality of TCM, especially in standardized cultivation, pollution-free standards, and batch-to-batch consistency. In addition, it is necessary to strengthen intergovernmental cooperation, create a good policy environment for the internationalization of TCM, adopt the method of negotiated trade packaging, completely break down policy barriers, and expand international market access for TCM services and products.

Cultivating compound talents in traditional Chinese medicine

Reporter: The development of TCM is inseparable from the construction of a talent team. How can we establish a talent training model that is in line with the characteristics of TCM, so as to strengthen the construction of a talent team with TCM characteristics?

Zhang Boli: Talent cultivation plays an important role in the development of TCM, especially the cultivation of backbone, leading and compound high-level talents. TCM talents in the new era should master solid and broad TCM knowledge, be familiar with TCM clinical thinking, have rich and diverse interdisciplinary knowledge including modern Western medicine, have solid professional basic skills, broad international vision, pioneering and innovative spirit, strong hands-on ability, and eventually become compound TCM talents engaged in clinical and scientific research.

In terms of talent training models, the combination of institutional education and teacher-apprentice education is currently a relatively successful talent training model. Of course, it is also necessary to meet the needs and realize classified training and classified evaluation. In this regard, various Chinese medicine colleges and universities across the country have made many beneficial explorations and reforms. In the new era, the training of Chinese medicine talents should focus on serving the entire life cycle of human health, with the goal of cultivating medical talents of all levels and types required for the construction of a healthy China, and build a team of Chinese medicine talents around the core capabilities of Chinese medicine talents. Although there is a long way to go, we have already set off!