The clinical handover, which is associated with the observation of the changes in patients′ status and the implementation of nursing process, plays a vital role in critical care. Also, the quality of clinical hand-over has a far-reaching impact on patient safety due to the complicate condition of critical patients. Over the past few years, lots of studies have focused on the many aspects of clinical handover such as the contents of clinical handover, the standard procedure of clinical handover so as to reduce the risks associated with the unsystematic clinical handover.

Chinese materia medica and its compound formulas have the characteristics of multi-component,multi-target,and multi pathway effects,and have unique advantages in preventing and treating complex diseases.Network pharmacology explains disease patterns and drug mechanisms from the perspective of complex biological networks,and explores the pharmacological substance basis and target of Chinese medicine.This article summarized the application of network pharmacology from the aspects of biological basis of TCM syndrome,the substance basis and pharmacological mechanism of TCM,compatibility theory of TCM compound formulas,etc.,with the purpose to provide a reference for the research and application of network pharmacology in TCM.