A retrospective study was conducted to collect information about the general projects

youth science fund projects

and regional science fund projects that were funded by national Natural Science Foundation of China（NSFC） in the field of traditional Chinese internal medicine from 2015 to 2019. The results showed that in the past five years

NSFC has funded a total of 1014 projects with a total amount of 383.33 million yuan. It covered a wide range of diseases and involved various major systems of internal medicine

including digestive system

tumor-related system

circulatory system

nervous system

urinary system

respiratory system

endocrine system

and rheumatism and immune system

all of which had more than 10 projects funded by NSFC per year. The top 12 diseases in the number of funded projects were diabetes

cerebrovascular disease

diabetic nephropathy

lung cancer

chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

atherosclerosis

liver cancer/rheumatoid arthritis

ulcerative colitis

pulmonary fibrosis/gastric cancer

and heart failure. The funding from NSFC has helped promoting the exploration of therapeutic mechanism

professional development

discipline construction and talent cultivation of the dominant diseases in traditional Chinese internal medicine. However

there were also some deficiencies

such as insufficient support for traditional Chinese medicine

unbalanced development of the discipline

lack of coherence and continuity of research results

narrow scope of dominant diseases in traditional Chinese internal medicine

excessive imitation of international hot topics in scientific research

and lack of high-quality and top-notch talents. In view of the existing problems

we should develop our strengths and avoid weaknesses

attach importance to inheritance and innovation

and shift emphasis from laboratory to clinical studies

so as to better serve the development of traditional Chinese medicine.