Efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine combined with Western medicine for community-acquired pneumonia

Objective To explore the clinical efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine combined with Western medicine for community-acquired pneumonia. Methods From January 2009 to December 2009, 80 patients with community-acquired pneumonia were randomly assigned to receive conventional antibiotic therapy alone (control group), or the same therapy plus traditional Chinese medicine Shenqi mixture (study group). The efficacy of the therapies and the symptoms and signs were observed in all the patients. Results The efficiency and total efficiency were significantly higher in the study group than in the control group (52.5% vs. 20.0% and 87.5% vs. 60.0%,P<0.05). The study group was superior to the control group in the improvement of symptoms and signs except for pulmonaryrales. Conclusions Traditional Chinese medicine combined with Western medicine for community-acquired pneumonia achieves a better efficacy and is worth popularizing. Key words: Traditional Chinese medicine combined with Western medicine;  Community-acquired pneumonia;  Efficacy