Objective

2

To analyze the clinical characteristics and treatment patterns of ulcerative colitis （UC） patients with different traditional Chinese medicine （TCM） syndrome types in Jiangsu Province.

Methods

2

A cross-sectional study was conducted using the Jiangsu TCM Dominant Diseases Diagnosis & Treatment Data Platform. Electronic medical records of UC patients of 11 TCM hospitals in Jiangsu Province from December 24th， 2022 to December 31st， 2024 were extracted. Data included demographic information， disease characteristics， TCM syndrome types， laboratory indicators， and colonoscopy examinations. Using the large language model recognition technology of Llama3-70B and DeepSeek-70B， this study analyzed the distribution of TCM syndromes in UC patients and compared the clinical characteristics of different syndromes. The use of herbal prescriptions for the most prevalent TCM syndromes in patients was statistically analyzed， focusing on high-frequency medicinal herbs used more than 5%； association rule analysis， clustering analysis， and latent dirichlet allocation （LDA） modeling were applied to explore medication rules and identify core prescriptions.

Results

2

A total of 8702 medical records were collected， of which 6622 were included in the analysis， including 3568 cases of large intestine damp-heat syndrome （53.9%）， 2492 cases of spleen deficiency with dampness encumbrance syndrome （37.6%）， 270 cases of liver constraint and spleen deficiency syndrome （4.1%）， 130 cases of spleen-kidney

yang

deficiency syndrome （2.0%）， 105 cases of

yin

and blood depletion syndrome （1.6%）， 36 cases of cold-heat complex syndrome （0.5%）， and 21 cases of intense heat-toxin syndrome （0.3%）. Statistically significant differences were observed among different TCM syndromes in terms of gender， age， clinical type， medication use， comorbidities， and laboratory indicators including serum albumin， C-reactive protein， prothrombin time， activated partial thromboplastin time， and total cholesterol （

P

＜0

.05）. An analysis was conducted on the most common prescription for patients with the most prevalent TCM syndrome （i.e. large intestine damp-heat）， showing that herbs such as huanglian （

Rhizoma Coptidis

）， stir-fried baizhu （

Rhizoma Atractylodis Macrocephalae

）， muxiang （

Radix Aucklandiae

）， fuling （

Poria

）， and dry-fried baishao （

Rhizoma Dioscoreae

） were used most frequently. Muxiang-huanglian was the most commonly used herbal pair. The LDA topic model identified the core prescription consisting of huanglian， stir-fried baizhu， muxiang， dry-fried baishao， huangqin （

Radix Scutellariae

）， dry-fried yiyiren （

Semen Coicis

）， baitouweng （

Radix Pulsatillae

）， chenpi （

Pericarpium Citri Reticulatae

）， diyu （

Radix Sanguisorbae

）， gancao （

Radix et Rhizoma Glycyrrhizae

）， dry-fried shanyao （

Rhizoma Dioscoreae

） and qinpi （

Cortex Fraxini

）.

Conclusion

2

In Jiangsu province， large intestine damp-heat syndrome is the most common TCM syndrome type among UC patients. Patients with different TCM syndrome types exhibit distinct characteristics in terms of demographics， disease features， and medication use. Those with large intestine damp-heat syndrome show higher inflammatory indicators than the average level， and the core prescription mainly consists of herbs with the functions of clearing heat， drying dampness， fortifying the spleen， and promoting

qi

movement.