Xu Xiaohui, Li Limin, Zhou Heng, Fan Mingcong, Wang Hongliang, Wang Lingling, Hu Qing, Cai Qiang, Zhu Yin, Ji Shen
Yangtze Delta Region Institute of Tsinghua University, Zhejiang 314006, China.
Shanghai Institute for Food and Drug Control, NMPA Key Laboratory for Quality Control of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 201203, China.
Ecotoxicol Environ Saf. 2023 Jan 1;249:114395. doi: 10.1016/j.ecoenv.2022.114395. Epub 2022 Dec 9.
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is still considered a global complementary or alternative medical system, but exogenous hazardous contaminants remain in TCM even after decocting. Besides, it is time-consuming to conduct a risk assessment of trace elements in TCMs with a non-automatic approach due to the wide variety of TCMs. Here, we present MRTCM, a cloud-computing infrastructure for automating the probabilistic risk assessment of metals and metalloids in TCM. MRTCM includes a consumption database and a pollutant database involving forty million rows of consumption data and fourteen types of TCM potentially toxic elements concentrations. The algorithm of probabilistic risk assessment was also packaged in MRTCM to assess the risks of eight elements with Monte Carlo simulation. The results demonstrated that 96.64% and 99.46% had no non-carcinogenic risk (hazard indices (HI) were < 1.0) for animal and herbal medicines consumers, respectively. After twenty years of exposure, less than 1% of the total carcinogenic risk (CR) was > 10 for TCM consumers, indicating that they are at potential risk for carcinogenicity. Sensitivity analysis revealed that annual consumption and concentration were the main variables affecting the assessment results. Ultimately, a priority management list of TCMs was also generated, indicating that more attention should be paid to the non-carcinogenic risks of As, Mn, and Hg and the carcinogenic risks of As and Cr in Pheretima and Cr in Arcae Conch. In general, MRTCM could significantly enhance the efficiency of risk assessment in TCM and provide reasonable guidance for policymakers to optimize risk management.
传统中药（TCM）仍被视为一种全球补充或替代医学体系，但即使经过煎煮，中药中仍存在外源性有害污染物。此外，由于中药种类繁多，采用非自动方法对中药中的微量元素进行风险评估耗时较长。在此，我们展示了MRTCM，这是一种用于自动化中药中金属和类金属概率风险评估的云计算基础设施。MRTCM包括一个消费数据库和一个污染物数据库，其中包含四千万行消费数据以及十四种中药潜在有毒元素的浓度。概率风险评估算法也被封装在MRTCM中，以通过蒙特卡罗模拟评估八种元素的风险。结果表明，动物药和草药消费者分别有96.64%和99.46%没有非致癌风险（危害指数（HI）<1.0）。经过二十年的接触，中药消费者中总致癌风险（CR）>10的比例不到1%，表明他们存在潜在致癌风险。敏感性分析表明，年消费量和浓度是影响评估结果的主要变量。最终，还生成了一份中药优先管理清单，表明应更多关注地龙中砷、锰和汞的非致癌风险以及文蛤中砷和铬以及蚶壳中铬的致癌风险。总体而言，MRTCM可以显著提高中药风险评估的效率，并为政策制定者优化风险管理提供合理指导。
