大量的临床实践表明,扶正祛邪的治疗原则并不适用于某些恶性肿瘤或肿瘤的中晚期。通过扶正的方法监视邪、管制邪、控制邪,使邪与正长期“和平共处”,最大限度地保证病人机体的病态平衡,达到延长寿命和保证生存质量的目标,这就是“扶正抑邪”的治疗原则。“扶正祛邪”与“扶正抑邪”在治疗目标、临床适用范围、治疗方法、使用方药上均不尽相同。扶正之所以能够抑邪是因其能提高机体免疫功能,增强自然抗病能力,促进肿瘤细胞凋亡,达到抑瘤目的,取得带瘤生存的效果。

A lot of clinic cases indicate that the therapeutic principle of strengthening body resistance to eliminate pathogenic factors appears unappropriate to some malignant tumours or tumors which are already in their middle or late period. The therapeutic principle of strengthening body resistance to suppress pathogenic factors is, however, to supervise pathogenic factors, put them under surveillance and control them as well as keep body resistance and pathogenic factors in a long-term "peaceful coexistence", thereby maintaining to the maximum the balance of the patient's body in a pathogenic state and attaining the goals of prolonging life and assuring the quality of existence. There exist quite a lot of differences between "strengthening body resistance to eliminate pathogenic factors" and "strengthening body resistance to suppress pathogenic factors" in their targets of treatment, their scopes of clinic practice, their therapeutic schedules and their composition of prescriptions. That strengthening the body resistance can be able to eliminate pathogenic factors is due to the fact that it can afford to improve the immunity of body and enhance its ability of resistance to diseases and advance the apoptosis of tumour cells, thus achieving the goal of inhibiting tumours and the result of living with tumors.