Prescription patterns of herbal medicine for menopausal disorders in major Korean medicine hospitals: a multicenter retrospective study

BACKGROUND: This study aimed to obtain the symptom, prescription and therapeutic patterns for the treatment of patients with menopausal syndrome in major Korean medicine (KM) hospitals. METHODS: We used a retrospective chart review of climacteric disorder and postmenopausal syndrome patients by examining medical records (ICD-10, menopausal and female climacteric states: N95.1, Menopausal and perimenopausal disorder, unspecified: N95.9) from eight university KM hospitals in South Korea. RESULTS: The main symptoms of 1,682 patients with menopausal disorders visiting eight college-affiliated oriental medicine hospitals were hot flush, hyperhidrosis, fatigue, insomnia, and chest tightness. Guipi decoction, Si-wu guipi decoction, Qing-xin lianzi-yin, Jiawei xiao-yao-san and Guipi wen-dan decoction were the most commonly prescribed treatments for menopausal disorders. Patients were most often treated with a combination of herbal medicine and acupuncture. CONCLUSION: Our study shows that the current prescribed herbal medicines were used for treating menopausal disorders in Korean medicine hospitals. However, the objectivity of the efficacy assessment should be studied further.