Fig. 1

Experimental design and collection of clinical data. A Study design. Patients were enrolled for eligibility assessment based on inclusion criteria. Thirty-five patients were enrolled. “D0–D30” denotes from Day 0 (D0) to Day 30 (D30), and represents differences in patients before and after Dicetel treatment in terms of the Symptom Index score as well as collected blood samples before and after treatment. Eventually, 24 patients provided Discomfort Index scores before and after treatment. D37–D67 represents differences in patients before and after CGGD treatment in terms of the Symptom Index score and collected blood samples before and after treatment. In the middle of these two periods is a 1-week washout period. Thirty-one patients provided scores for the Discomfort Index before and after treatment. “D30 vs. D0” denotes the procedure of exploring the therapeutic effect of Dicetel and the effect of the human metabolome. “D67 vs. D37” refers to the procedure of exploring the therapeutic effect of CGGD and the effect of the human metabolome. B Clinical data. The numerical mean of the Symptom Index score and error bar, and P-value are shown. *Represents differences between different groups of the same target. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. P-value was calculated by the Student’s t-test. Y-axis represents the symptom under different criteria. The X-axis represents the average Symptom Index score when taking different drugs at different stages. Criteria are divided into Rome IV and TCM. The Symptom Index score of patients under different criteria (Rome IV or TCM) is selected, followed by selected by different reference indicators under these two criteria (Additional file 1: Table S1). First, the enrollment time was recorded as “D0” and the Symptom Index was recorded. Second, after 4 weeks of treatment with Dicetel, the Symptom Index score of patients condition at this time was recorded as “D30”. Third, after the washout period (1 week), the Symptom Index score was recorded as “D37”. Finally, after 4 weeks of treatment with CGGD, the Symptom Index score was recorded as “D67”