Effective Herbal Products for Common Diseases
TCM Health-care Regulation Program
Dr. WeiLian.Wang
王伟联 主编
唐振邦 翻译
HK SANLIDA Int'l Healthcare Products Co.,Limited
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Contents
*Foreword
*Origin of TCM
*Interpretation of Terms of TCM
Yin and Yang Description of symptoms Nomenclature qi Five Elements
Five internal organs(Zang) and six hollow organs(Fu)
Meridians and collaterals Causes of Illness
Wind Cold Damp Dry Hot Endogenous Evils
*Doctor Wang’s Answers
To Questions about TCM and Regulation
*TCM
Health-care Regulation Program
I Preservation of Health
1.Preservation of health in spring and summer
2. Preservation of health in autumn and winter
3.For Children 4.For men 5.For women 6. Reduction of weight
7. Relief from eyestrain 8. Withdrawal from alcoholism
II Treatment and Regulation
1. Diseases of the respiratory system 2. Diseases of the Digestive System
3. Diseases of the nervous system 4. Eye, nose and throat diseases
5. Diseases of the blood-circulation system
6. Endocrine, metabolic and urological diseases
7. Diseases of the immunosystem 8. Andropathy 9. Gynecologic diseases
10. Diseases of skin and skeleton 11. Cancer
*Table of Regulated Prescriptions
*About SANLIDA
Invitation of Applications
*Momentous Development in TCM
System of Disease-entity Identification
TCM Intelligent Diagnostic-therapeutic Software
TCM Telemedicine
* List of herbal Products
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Foreword
Many people are now looking for help from traditional Chinese medicine. They are, for example, patients of chronic diseases which have been diagnosed as to be without any radical cure; patients whose diseases have been diagnosed to be extremely serious and who hope to find another way out in traditional Chinese medicine; patients who do not want to undergo surgical operations and wish to be subjected to some “conservative treatment”; and patients who are convalescing in hospital after surgical operation or after being hospitalized and who choose traditional Chinese medicine as auxiliary treatment or for health-care purposes. There are other people, who are of the opinion that traditional Chinese medicines can be used for“regulation” of their bodies and they hope to take herbal drugs for routine health care so as to improve their individual constitutions.
This book is designed not only to make you get in the easiest way possible a concise and systematic knowledge of traditional Chinese medicine but also to recommend to you ready-made traditional Chinese medicines which are easily available. On the basis of these ready-made Chinese medicines a number of health-care programs have been devised for your benefit. In these programs diseases are classified according to the nomenclature used in Western medicine so as to make the programs easier to consult for those people who are not acquainted with traditional Chinese medicine.
This book is not only suitable for collection by common readers, but also worthy of reading by people of the medical profession.
If you visit www.sldint.com to download this ebook in PDF format in the User Center after register, this book is not only practical but also vivid in color, rich and magnificent in both pictures and language. In the book there are quite a number of classical pictures of immense academic value pertaining to the realm of traditional Chinese medicine, including a set of fourteen exquisite pictorial illustrations of channels and collaterals of the human meridian system.
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Origin of TCM
In the course of development of human civilization there have appeared four traditional medical systems. Apart from the traditional Chinese medicine, there were Egyptian, Roman, and Indian medical systems. However, the latter three traditional medical systems gradually declined until they became extinct, with only individual prescriptions having survived by being scattered and preserved among the populations.
The method of thinking is of paramount importance as the basis and norm of behaviour in the development of every field of natural science. So, TCM has a close relationship with Chinese classical philosophy.
The underlying fundamental ideological thesis of Chinese classical philosophy is a system of philosophical theoretical thinking having a scheme of four dimensions, which are "the way of heaven", "the way of earth", "the human way" and "the change of seasons". In other words, Chinese classical philosophy considers the principles governing the changes in the universe and the heavenly bodies, the rules that underlie geophysics and the evolution of creatures: animals and plants, and the laws governing the changes in human societies to be one organic totality with its components mutually influencing and constraining each other, with revelations of changes in matters and things that go on with the passage of time as the basis for investigations.
Therefore, Chinese classical philosophy is a mode of thinking by "synthetic analysis". In classical Chinese philosophy, the scientific proposition of "interactions between man and nature" was put forward on the foundation of this basic ideology.
Traditional Chinese medical practitioners hold the view that the human body is an organic whole, that a local change which is a disorder can affect the entire body while a pathological change in the whole body can be reflected as a local phenomenon, and that, therefore, although the pathological essence of the change that is involved in the disease is hidden inside there must be a certain symptom or more than one symptom reflected outside.
In her medical practice of several thousand years, China has summed up her clinical experience, formed a complete theoretical system of medicine and,by virtue of its safety and efficacy, has made important contributions to the procreation and thriving of the Chinese people and has shown its tremendous vitality at the same time.
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Interpretation of Terms of TCM
*Yin and Yang
The theory of Yin and Yang in traditional Chinese medicine is the product of combination of the ancient Chinese dialectical method of thinking and the rich experience gained in traditional medical work. Yin and Yang constitute not only an important component part of the basic theory of traditional Chinese medicine but also an instrument for summing up its clinical experience. This means that the view on unity of opposites as shown in the relation between Yin and Yang and also about decline and growth and about mutual transformation between the opposites Yin and Yang was used to explicate the relation between man and nature and to generalize a series of questions in the field of medicine.
2. The implications of Yin and Yang:Yang(Masculine)---pushing into motion, playing the leading role, and being immovable in determination. In traditional Chinese medicine, Yangrepresents the functional activities of organs, the external defense, and the firm internal protection of Yin essence.Yin(Feminine) ---keeping to the faith, tending to agree and accept, and being flexible and compliant. In traditional Chinese medicine, Yin represents the conservation and storage of material substances, the source of the vital energy of Yang.For example, in the distinction between the two sexes, the male is Yang and the female is Yin.
*Description of symptoms
Yang deficiency:This term refers to inadequacy of vital energy. Clinical manifestations are: hands and feet lacking warmth , body prone to sweat on all occasions, stool being very wet and shapeless, urine being colorless, lips being light in color, and mouth feeling flat and insipid.
Yin deficiency: This term refers to inadequacy of body fluids. Clinical manifestations are: Feeling the two palms and two soles hot in the centers, having subjective consciousness of some annoying heat in the bosom, suffering a hectic fever in the early afternoon, going about constantly with reddened lips and feeling the mouth dry, and haunted by the excretion of dry and hardened stool.
*Nomenclature
Pulmonary Yin--- fluid of the lungs, produced by chemical combination of the essence of water and grain with renal fluid.This pulmonary Yin is complementary to what is called the pulmonary qi, which is its opposite and might well be called pulmonary Yang as it represents “vital energy”.
2.Kidney Yin-also called renal fluid or genuine fluid, is no other than the fluid of the renal organ (including the essence of life, which the renal organ contains). It is called kidney Yin as it is counterposed to kidney Yang, the vital energy, and serves as the material basis on which kidney Yang performs its functional activities. Kidney Yin hasthe effect of nourishing and moistening various viscera and hollow organs of the human body.
*The term qi
Denotes minute particles of material, rich in nutrition and circulating around the body, e.g. the qi of water and grain.
Denotes the active power of viscera, e.g. the qi of the five internal organs.
In clinical work, when the term qi is used, it most probably denotes a symptom or symptoms of some disorder of the viscera, e.g. The qi of the liver offends the stomach.
*Five internal organs(Zang) and six hollow organs(Fu)
Traditional Chinese medicine holds the view that in the human body there are five substantial Zang organs (Zang is dark in color), each of which corresponds to a Fu organ, which is an internally hollow organ (Fu is light in color) and is connected with other Fu organs through channels and collaterals, thus forming two distinct zang and Fu systems, differing widely from the theory of Western anatomy so far as functions are concerned.
The term five internal organs usually denotes heart, liver, spleen, lungs and kidneys
Heart (心--火）: heart storing spirit and governing blood and vessels;
Lung（肺--金）: lung governing qi,storing inferior spirit; lung connecting all vessels;
Liver（肝-木）: liver controlling conveyance and dispersion;
liver
governing ascending and dredging;
Spleen（脾-土）:spleen
governing movement and transformation;
spleen being acquired foundation;
spleen governing ascending clear;
spleen controlling blood;
spleen governing limbs;
spleen governing muscles;
Kidney（肾--水）: kidney governing storage;
kidney governing reproduction;
kidney governing water metabolism;
kidney governing bones;
The term hollow organ generally denotes an organ in the abdomen which is hollow inside and has a cavity, performing the function of receiving, storing, transporting and transforming water and grain.
The six hollow organs comprise: gallbladder, stomach, bowels, intestines, (urinary) bladder and the three visceral cavities (which house the internal organs). The three visceral cavities are passages for the circulation of water and grain and vital energy.
Note: The terms spleen (i.e. the explanation of the term) and three visceral cavities are unique and specific to traditional Chinese medicine in its theory of the five internal organs and the six internal hollow organs.
*Meridians and collaterals:
The main passages of the network are the principal channels, which connect different parts of the body and through which vital energy circulates, regulating bodily functions. The branches that diverge from the principal channels and link them with each other, forming a network throughout the body, are called collateral channels.
This network constitutes the entire system of passages for circulating vital energy throughout the body, connecting the visceral organs and the limbs and joints of the body, providing communication all over the body, and regulating all bodily functions.
*Theory of the Five Elements
The theory of the five elements is one of the basic theories inherited by traditional Chinese medicine from ancient natural philosophy. It concerns the composition and evolution of the universe.
The five
elements are: wood (木）,
fire（火）,
earth（土）,
metal（金）
and water（水）.
They are used in traditional Chinese medicine to expound the
correspondence between man and the universe, and to delineate in
particular the physiological and pathological relationships between
the various internal organs of the human body.
For the latter purpose, traditional Chinese medicine classifies the internal organs according to the properties of the five elements either by analogy or by deduction. To be specific, the five organs i.e. Liver(肝）, heart（心）, spleen（脾）, lung（肺） and kidney（肾） are considered to be equivalent to wood, fire, earth, metal and water respectively. However, this linkage of the internal organs to the five elements is not a matter of simple analogy. It has profound implications.
*Whatever pertains to wood has the property of being able to grow, become plentiful and extend with ease in different directions;
*Whatever pertains to fire has the property of warming, heating and leaping up; *Whatever pertains to earth has the property of implementing conveyance, receipt and acceptance, and production and changes of things;
*Whatever pertains to metal has the property of cleaning, cutting down and contracting;
*Whatever pertains to water has the property of cooling, moistening and moving downward. Moreover, the five elements are related to each other in an intricate manner, as is shown below.
*Relationships between the five elements:
1. by generation or promotion（生, 相生）:
The five elements generate (i.e. produce) or promote one another in the order of wood, fire, earth, metal, water, and wood again.
2. by restriction or subjugation（克，相克）:
The five elements restrict or subjugate one another in the order of water, fire, metal, wood, earth, and water again.
The theory of the five elements can be used in traditional Chinese medicine not only for theoretical reasoning and explication but also for practical guidance in clinical work.
*Illustrations of diagnoses made by using the theory of the five elements:
Wood fire torturing metal: This expresses a pathological change which consists in that excessive liver fire consumes lung fluid, causing dry cough and chest pain or even hemoptysis accompanied by irritability, bitterness in the mouth, and blood-shot eyes.
Earth failing to control water: This expresses a pathological change which consists in that a weak spleen, being unable to control the water flow, may lead to edema or retained fluid.
Exuberant wood subjugating earth: This expresses a pathological change involving disharmony between the liver and the spleen and stomach, in which hyperactivity of the former (liver) is primary, while insufficiency of the latter (spleen and stomach) is secondary.
Fire failing to generate earth: This expresses a pathological change in which fire of the life gate (i.e. kidney yang) is insufficient to warm the spleen and stomach, bringing on such symptoms as diarrhea, indigestion, intolerance of cold, and edema.
Thus it can be seen that application of the theory of the five elements in traditional Chinese medicine is chiefly for analysis of and research in the mutual relationships of the viscera, the channels and collaterals of the human meridian system, for study of the various physiological functions of the human body, and for clarification of their effects and influences on each other in pathological conditions.
*Salivary fluids :
This is the combination name of saliva and body fluids. It means the fluid in the human body, which is produced by chemical transformation from the minute particles of dietary water and grain.
*Causes of illness:
In ancient times the causes of illness were divided into three classes, namely “endogenous”, “exogenous” and “non-endo-non-exogenous” factors.
Endogenous factors:
This
denotes certain pathogenic factors which arise inside the human body
and cause illness, chiefly the condition of rise and fall of a
person’s healthiness,as
is implied in the common saying that “If
healthiness exists inside, evils cannot offend.”(Whatever
is harmful to the human body is called in traditional Chinese
medicine by the generalizing term evil,that
is pathogen) The term healthiness
comprises in its meaning both the physical
constitution, the mental state and resistance to illness.
Exogenous factors:
This denotes the fact of being affected by certain pathogenic factors in the external world (i.e. nature). Traditional Chinese medical scholars call these pathogenic factors by the term external evils as well. Traditional Chinese medicine borrowed the names of natural phenomena, such as wind, cold, summer, damp, dry, hot (fire)and their characteristics to generalize the causes of all diseases resulting from interference in the human body by external factors and also for use in the description of causes and symptoms of various diseases, as shown below:
Wind: for showing that the symptom of a disease is migratory in its place of occurrence and changeable in form, like wind.
Cold: for describing symptoms of deterioration of a function, e.g. running a fever, having a painful joint, or having abdominal pain or diarrhea.
Fire(s): for describing symptoms which are manifestations of hyperfunctioning of some organ(s) in the process of pathological variations and may be further divided into two categories, i.e. substantial fires and deficiency fires.
Substantial fires are due mostly to rampancy of disease evils and in the majority of cases are manifested as high fevers, heavy sweating, and propensity to fly into a temper.
Deficiency fires are due mostly to deficits in body fluids and are found principally in chronic wasting diseases, manifesting themselves in the majority of cases as feeling worried unnecessarily and lying in bed sleepless, or having seminal emissions at night, often with dreams.
Damp: for describing obstacles to the performance of the function of transport and transformation of food in the body, often seen as joint pain, muscular pain, poor appetite or a sensation of suppression in the chest.
Dry: for indicating a person being affected by dryness and suffering loss of salivary fluids in such a way that this loss is transformed into heat and fire. The symptoms are seen in the majority of cases as red eyes, swollen gums, sore throat or dry coughs.
Non-endo-non-exogenous factors:
This term denotes a category of illness the causes of which are obvious by themselves consisting chiefly in hunger or surfeit, the person’s house or room being not sanitary, an injury or wound resulting from a fall or from a beating, or having been bitten by an insect or an animal.
*Endogenous evils( pathogen):
This term denotes pathogenic factors, such as phlegm stasis and blood stasis in the body, posterior or secondary to some disease.
1.Phlegm:This term denotes the pathological product secreted by the respiratory tract and includes in its scope the mucous substances accumulated in the tissues of certain organs which have undergone pathological changes. Such mucous substances, which are transformed from salivary fluids, impede the normal process of air formation in and passage through the viscera and hollow organs.
2.Blood stasis: This term denotes the symptom of blood becoming stagnant in flow and staying at a certain place in the body, which will lead to some substantial injury done to a part of the network of passages or to the function performance of certain viscera. It may combine with other evils (e.g. cold and phlegm) to give more obstinate pathological manifestations.
3. Toxicity: According to the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, toxicity falls into a number of types, which are, for example:
a. Internal toxicity: This term denotes noxious heat which seeps from inside.
b. Noxious dampness: This term refers to the fact that dampness may turn into toxicity after being pent up in the body for a long time.
c.Damp heat: This term is used to mean that owing to the fact that the spleen of the human body may not be healthy enough to transport well, dampness arises inside or, as a result of the body staying at a damp place for too long, external evils invade into it and, having been pent up and lying dormant in it for quite a time, produce heat.
The treatment should center on reducing fever and facilitating increase of moisture. The concrete therapeutic method to be adopted varies with the place of the body where the affliction occurs.
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Doctor Wang’s Answers
(To Questions about Traditional Chinese Medicine)
Why is “yin vs. yang” so important in traditional Chinese medicine?
Answer: To people who are familiar with Western medicine, traditional Chinese medicine is quite abstract. Look at this picture. Isn’t the Galaxy like a gigantic revolving wheel? Aren’t all the planets revolving around the Sun and turning simultaneously each on its own axis?
Again, let’s take a look at our Earth. It’s very hot on earth in summer. But, if you fetch a bucket of water from a well, you’ll find that the water of the well is quite cool. In winter it is very cold on earth. The water in the well may have frozen, but miners working in a coal mine feel very hot. In spring, plants grow and blossom, but in autumn, trees generally shed leaves. Don’t such phenomena of Nature seem to show as if there were two kinds of energy on earth which are circulating and transforming into each other?
I invited you to observe the universe and the earth not for the purpose of inducing you to learn astronomy, but in order to show you that since the circulatory motions within the human body are invisible to the naked human eye traditional Chinese medicine can only resort to analogy with the universe to enable you to conceive and comprehend the internal workings of the human body.
By observation of the great Nature, ancient Chinese came to realize that man, being a part of Nature, must obey the laws of Nature, and so they put forward the view of “correspondence between human beings and the natural environment”, of which the simplest example is that a person generally enjoys good health if he/she gets up to work when the sun rises and stops working to rest when the sun sets.
By making such observations, ancient Chinese people came to understand that man is a product of Nature and there are circulatory motions within the human body akin to those of the heavenly bodies in the universe; that such motions require energy, which is of two types: yin and yang according to the direction of flow of the energy and that the human body tends to be in good health if the two types of energy which transform into each other in circulatory motions are equivalent and that the human body will suffer from various diseases if such equivalence is lacking.
2. What after all is “qi” of traditional Chinese medicine?
Let’s again make observations of the universe. Air is invisible, but don’t you feel its power whenever there is a typhoon raging? From observations, ancient Chinese realized that in air there must be matter which carries energy. They came to the conclusion that since man depends on food, water and inhaled air for the energy required by the human body the energy is produced by all the three of them. This energy is what traditional Chinese medicine calls “qi and blood”. The circulatory motions within the human body for the maintenance of equivalence between yin and yang need to depend not only on the energy of the tangible blood for propulsion but also on the invisible energy qi, which may also be represented as the functional activities of viscera such as the kidneys, expressed traditionally as the “kidney qi”. The term qi denotes additionally man’s vital energy, which is the life-power.
3. Does the human meridian system, which consists of channels and collaterals, really exist?
Answer: Don’t astronomers tell you that all the planets in the sky have their respective orbits of motion? However, if you confine your range of observation to a small space and limit your objects of observation to only one planet for a short length of time, can you see its orbit?
In the view of traditional Chinese medicine, a human being is a small universe. The existence of the human meridian system with its channels and collaterals was discovered by incessant observations of an entire human being and by summing up the results of such observations. The meridian system in the human body is no other than an intangible system of definite and interconnected passages through which qi is transmitted. It certainly cannot be seen by means of dissecting a cadaver, because in that way anatomy would take as its object of study only a lifeless body of flesh. The theory of the human meridian system has been demonstrated to be correct in the course of medical practice of thousands of years. The system of deep-breathing exercises, acupuncture and moxibustion, and the traditional Chinese medical massage were all developed in accordance with the theory of the human meridian system.
4. Why do you suggest that we take Inwarmer in the forenoon and Toniyin in the evening?
Traditional Chinese medical scholars discovered thousands of years ago that there exist close relationships between man and time and between man and the seasons
Early in the morning, when the sun rises, the body is ready to perform functional activities. As Inwarmer has the effect of making warmth take ascendancy in the body, it can strengthen the spleen and warm the stomach, encouraging more strenuous performance of functional activities if it is taken in the forenoon, whereas in the evening, when the sun sets, the power to perform functional activities within the human body subsides, it will be better for a person to take Toniyin because Toniyin has the principal effect of replenishing body fluids and so will moisten the throat, clear the body of dryness and heat, conducing to a good rest.
Do you know why so many healthy people hurry to the lavatory early in the morning to make stool? Traditional Chinese medicine discovered that there are l2 channels in this meridian system and that each of these channels, i.e. meridians, has its primary time of the day for passage. As 5-7 o’clock in the morning is the time at which the flow of vital energy of the body enters the big-intestine meridian, a great number of people feel the urge to defecate. Incidentally, why do some people speak of the need to “adjust the time difference”? That’s because passage of energy through each channel is connected with the time of the day. When a person arrives at a new place, he/she instinctively feels a need to make some adjustment of his/her daily habits in order to adapt to the change in the body of the primary time for passage through each of the channels, or meridians.
5. How is it that practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine can assess a patient’s internal health condition by inferring from his/her external characteristics?
Answer: Let’s take as an example the simple case of assessing the internal condition of a watermelon when you want to buy one from among a great multitude of watermelons at a stall in the market. In China a stallholder usually offers customers his gratuitous service and so you will have a good choice made for you. A person who has engaged in planting or selling watermelons all his life knows how to make the best choice simply by relying on his experience. Similarly, a medical practitioner can assess a patient’s internal condition visually by relying on his/her personal experience, in addition to using his/her knowledge of traditional Chinese medicine, which is indispensable even in this case for no other reason than that traditional Chinese medicine is a natural science with a long history of development through incessant observation and practice.
Why should herbal medicines be classified as having the hot, cool, etc. property respectively?
Answer: Traditional Chinese medicine evaluates a certain plant or mineral on the basis of its effect on the human body. Traditional Chinese medicine describes these drugs, including our daily foods, in the following respects;
Drug property: There are hot, warm, even, cool, and cold drugs. For example, the ginger we eat is hot, while mutton is warm. As a further example, if a person has got herpes simplex, which usually occurs as a concomitant of fever, it is said that he/she is afflicted by a heat toxin and that a cool drug is needed to clear the body of the heat toxin. If that person should eat some roasted dish, he/she might find on the next day that his/her illness became more serious. Therefore, the cooking method can change the property of a food. Many people like to eat fruits or even cooked dishes taken direct from the refrigerator. This habit might increase the pathogenic cold in the stomach, and we have the right to say that refrigeration changes the property of a cooked dish.
Drug tastes: They include the bitter, sweet, sour, salty, pungent and bland tastes.
Meridian tropism: This means classification of drugs according to the meridian(s) on which their therapeutic action is manifested, e.g. Radix Platycodi and Radix Asteris are grouped under the lung meridian because of their antitussive effect in cases of lung diseases. Let’s take as another example a woman who does not secrete enough milk to feed her newborn baby. In order to solve the problem, she need only take the herbal medicine “seed of cowherb” (Vaccaria segetalis), which acts on the meridians of liver and stomach, which are closely connected with the breasts. This herbal medicine is used as a galactagogue. The woman will have her lactation increased by adding an appropriate amount of it to her meat or fish soup.
Directions, or rather trends, of drug actions: There are four directions, or trends, of drug actions. They are: ascending, descending, floating and sinking. The ascending and floating drugs have an upward and outward effect, and they are used for activating vitality, inducing sweating and dispelling cold, while the descending and sinking drugs, which have a downward and inward effect, are used for achieving tranquilization, causing contraction, relieving cough, arresting emesis, and promoting diuresis or purgation. For example, a man has become impotent. According to traditional Chinese medicine, if he wants to improve his potency he should take an ascending drug. This is why most of the ingredients of Sanlida are from warm to hot, which evidently is intended to accomplish the purpose of “ascending”. However, longtime administration of Sanlida might lead to excess heat in the body. As the human body needs harmony between ascending and descending, Inwarmer should be taken at the same time as Sanlida, because it is a herbal medicine for treating spleen and stomach diseases in a harmonious manner. Since Inwarmer combines warmth with descending, its combined use with Sanlida will make it possible for Sanlida to be used continually for a long period of time.
7. What is the dialectical method of diagnosis and treatment used in traditional Chinese medicine?
When a patient comes, the traditional Chinese medical practitioner, basing his/her work on the data collected, makes analysis and synthesis to discern the cause and nature of the disease, which is generally at a certain place of the body or, instead, may be a systemic disease, elucidates the relationship between the pathogenic evil and the patient’s healthiness, and through generalization comes to the diagnosis.
In the case of postpartum abdominal pain, for example, the practitioner may advise the patient that Chinese angelica, mutton and ginger be boiled together to make a soup for her to eat, and it will happen most probably that her illness will be cured. Why? Because the woman has lost too much blood. She needs to have the vital energy of her liver replenished. In the circulatory motions within the human body the meridian of the liver conduces upward. When the vital energy in the liver meridian does not flow upward but tends downward, the symptom shown is abdominal pain. Chinese angelica can warm and tonify liver blood, mutton can warm and tonify vital energy in the liver, and ginger can dispel pathogenic cold in the body. When the blood of the liver has been nourished and tonified together with the vital energy, the hepatic vital energy will become so strong as to ascend with considerable force, thereby causing the disease to disappear.
In traditional Chinese medicine, the motion of vital energy in the spleen and stomach--- internal organs which are in the middle part of the human body--- is considered to be circular in form and taken to be the “shaft”. For a similar reason, the circular motion of vital energy in outer parts of the body which comprise lungs, liver, heart and kidneys are likened to the “wheel”. The woman patient mentioned above who takes dishes of mutton soup to have her lactation increased is, by analogy, making the “wheel” revolve with the help of an external force.
Thus, the way by which traditional Chinese medicine treats diseases is quite simple. It may be generalized as to be of three types:
Driving the shaft so as to bring into rotation the wheel
Turning the wheel so as to bring into rotation the shaft
Turning the shaft and the wheel simultaneously.
8. Why do traditional Chinese medical practitioners speak so often of “regulating”?
In traditional Chinese medicine, treatment consists of “three-tenths in therapeutic attention and seven-tenths in resting and nourishment”. Resting and nourishment is no less than “regulating”. The essence of the method of treatment is to alleviate the symptoms at the onset of the illness and to tackle and eradicate the root cause of it when the patient’s condition becomes stabilized, which means that the regulating method is used at a later time for the purpose of restoring proper functioning to the internal organs.
9. Why does traditional Chinese medicine emphasize regulating spleen and stomach?
The clump of nerves of every organ leads to the stomach, which means that a person depends on food and its digestion and absorption for the nourishment of the entire body. Traditional Chinese medicine says that spleen and stomach can produce vitality, which is fundamentally the same as saying that they give rise to the person’s life power. Since the stomach is in the middle of the human body, traditional Chinese medicine speaks figuratively of the vitality produced by it as “vitality in the form of a shaft” and indicates explicitly that if that shaft revolves with great force it can bring into rotation the “wheel”, by which is meant figuratively the whole body of the human being. Therefore, life power will abound when there is sufficient vitality. No doubt, if the medicine and the supplemented nourishment cannot be absorbed by the body via the stomach, life will come to an end.
Therefore, the fundamental principle of traditional Chinese medicine is striving for the preservation of vitality. When faced with a doubtful, , tough clinical problem, the first therapeutic method that comes to the practitioner’s mind is naturally based on regulating spleen and stomach so that the feeble patient might have more vitality produced, which means to have more life power restored to him/her.