Traditional Chinese medicine-based visual assessment of tongue features associated with current cancer vs. no cancer history: a matched case-control study
Selected tongue features, particularly spider sublingual veins and tooth marks, were associated with current cancer in exploratory analyses. However, discrimination was modest, and inter-rater reliability varied across features. These findings should be interpreted cautiously and do not support diagnostic utility. Standardized definitions, rater training, and external validation in larger prospective, multi-center cohorts are required before clinical translation.
Authors
- Vincent Chan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5536-1565)
- Benjamin Kimble (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3778-4027)
- Meng-Hua Chen
- Suzi Mansu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5762-5261)
- Brian H. May (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5864-3020)
- M. Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1423-986X)
- S. Stylianou
- Zhen Zheng
- Lin Dong
- Yong-Kang Wu
- Byeongsang Oh
- Daniel Man-yuen Sze
Institutions
- The University of Sydney (AU)
- Mission Australia (AU)
- MIT University (MK)
- The Centre of Chinese Medicine (GB)
- RMIT University (AU)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Frontiers in Medicine
- Published
- 2026-01-30
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2026.1761943
- Primary Topic
- Traditional Chinese Medicine Studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00