Clinical Experience with Treatment of Patients who Retested Positive in the Recovery Period of COVID-19 Based on Traditional Chinese Medicine Syndrome Differentiation

To explore the characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and the efficacy of traditional Chinese materia medica in patients with positive results in virus retests in the recovery period of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). The clinical symptoms, tongue features, and lung computed tomography (CT) findings before and after treatment were recorded in detail by case series observation. The clinical symptoms of three patients with moderate COVID-19 who retested positive improved after combined TCM and symptomatic treatment. Lung CT showed that the inflammation resolved or improved progressively. Two patients continuously showed negative results in severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) nucleic acid retests, and were in complete remission and discharged. There was a persistence of positive results in SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid tests in one patient. Our experience is that the TCM treatment approaches of strengthening body resistance and eliminating pathogenic factors, cultivating earth, and generating metal, as well as eliminating dampness and resolving phlegm achieved good clinical effects in patients with COVID-19 who retested positive.