Treatment Experience of Connective Tissue Disease, March 11, 1995

Treatment Experience of Connective Tissue Disease, March 11, 1995

In the spring of the Year of the Pig, a 50-year-old woman presented with elevated blood counts, 82% lymphocyte percentage, low-grade fever, and joint pain. She had previously been diagnosed at the First Hospital of Lanzhou University by Professor Ma Lanfang as having "chronic lymphocytic leukemia" (atypical bone marrow picture). After ineffective medication, she came for consultation. Upon examination, her erythrocyte sedimentation rate was 120 mm/h, suggesting an atypical bone marrow picture and a high ESR (exceeding the level typical of leukemia). Therefore, I tried treating her with a connective tissue disease formula. The prescription included: chicken blood vine, dodder seed, polygonum cuspidatum, Rehmannia, black ginseng, dendrobium, smilax glabra, Dipsacus, and black nightshade, along with Gui Zhi Shaoyao Zhi Mu Tang, Wu Wei Xiao Du Yin, Dang Gui Liu Huang Tang, raw coix seed, Chuanwu, Cao Wu, and strychnos nux-vomica. After 20 doses, the ESR dropped to 15 mm/h, and all symptoms subsided.