Traditional Chinese Medicine

Posts Tagged ‘chinese medicine’

Traditional Chinese medication, usually using herbs as its main ingredient. And its usually taste very awful, though it got good effect and reduce the pain. But don’t you know the importance of thing to get the best effect is on collecting it.

The herbs that usually used are coming from leaves, flowers, fruit, seed, or even roots. To collect it there are something that you should know as below:
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The Ginseng plant grows in rich woods throughout eastern and central North America, especially along the mountains from Quebec and Ontario, south to Georgia. It was used by the North American Indians. It is a smooth perennial herb, with a large, fleshy, very slow-growing root, 2 to 3 inches in length (occasionally twice this size) and from 1/2 to 1 inch in thickness. Its main portion is spindle-shaped and heavily annulated (ringed growth), with a roundish summit, often with a slight terminal, projecting point. more
At the lower end of this straight portion, there is a narrower continuation, turned obliquely outward in the opposite direction and a very small branch is occasionally borne in the fork between the two. Some small rootlets exist upon the lower portion. The color ranges from a pale yellow to a brownish color. It has a mucilaginous sweetness, approaching that of liquorice, accompanied with some degree of bitterness and a slight aromatic warmth, with little or no smell. The stem is simple and erect, about a foot high, bearing three leaves, each divided into five finely-toothed leaflets, and a single, terminal umbel, with a few small, yellowish flowers. The fruit is a cluster of bright red berries.
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During the last few decades the health industry has boomed and supposed wonder drugs are getting explored every now and then. We have explored genetically modified crops, wholly organic cultivation and ever improved health supplements. But there are a few incredibly beneficial and completely natural ways of health enhancement waiting to be explored.
Goji juice is one of the most notable among them. Offering the unbelievable benefits of Lycium Barbarum berries, Goji juice is one of the best kept secrets of the Himalayas. Though unknown to the outside world, Goji has been held in esteem in the ancient wisdom of China, India and Tibet. The natives had benefited from the alkaline berry for over 3,000 years before its fame drew researchers and medical practitioners from outside. more
Goji juice is made from Goji berry which is also known as Chinese Wolfberry or Tibetan Goji berry. Goji vines are grown in valleys of Himalaya, Tibet, parts of China and Mongolia. The alkaline berry is very tender and is locally known as “happy berry” because of the positive state it induces. The berry has also been used in traditional Chinese medicine for many centuries now.
In China the berries are eaten raw, drunk as tea and is cooked too. The natives consider Goji as a miracle drug but that depends on what one means by miracle. However, scientific research has proved that Goji is incredibly rich in vital elements that the human body requires. Goji supplies the body with 19 amino acids including eight essential ones, 21 trace minerals, Betaine, Physlin and high amounts of vitamin B and E and fatty acids. Vitamin B is essential for converting food into energy.
The berry is remarkable for providing elements that are normally not found in fruits and berries. Vitamin E is one such element. Even if they are the quantities are never so high. There is 11 mg of iron per 100 gm of Goji berry. It also has a protein content which is higher that of many cereals. Goji contains complex phytonutrients and bio flavinoids. A full range of antioxidant carotenoids are present in the berry. Antioxidants are instrumental in neutralizing the free radical with the body and are thus essential to keeping the body young and revitalized. The berry is also rich in polysaccharides which are necessary for fortification of the immune system.
The immense benefits of Goji berries are made widely available in the form of Goji juice. While dried or dehydrated berries are also available in the market, the benefits of Goji are best availed in the form of juice. Goji juice is available either in pure form which can be mixed with other natural juices according to taste or it comes pr-mixed with other fruit juices to neutralize the mildly bitter taste. However, post mixing it tastes great.
Goji juice is a completely natural way of enhancing health and ensuring a continued sense of well being. However, one has to be careful while selecting a brand of Goji juice as it is being extensively marketed across the world as a miracle drug and that has given rise to many fraudulent marketers. That is why you will have to source it only from a well established and reputed company.

To discuss coffee’s classification into traditional Chinese medicine energetics I prefer to look at its actions and side effects. Increased alertness/energy, diuretic, diaphoretic, and purgative. The last three are easy to classify as drain dampness, resolve exterior and mild purgative. Classifying increased energy I think can mistakenly be classified as a Qi tonic. I mention mistakenly as I do not see coffee having any supplementing energies. If it were supplementing like Ren Shen or Huang Qi then I would expect over time that coffee would build your Qi and stamina. This is not the case. Once the effect of coffee wears off you are tired again and often more tired needing more coffee. I think coffee is borrowing from your jing and this is experienced as an increase in energy. Over time continuous coffee consumption will deplete your Jing and causes more fatigue. Bob Flaws explains how coffee can cause the stirring of ministerial fire giving you a sense of increased energy. more
To Quote Bob Flaws: It is also possible for ministerial fire to stir frenetically simply due to too much stirring. This means mental-emotional, verbal, and/or physical stirring. All stirring or movement is the expression of the activity of yang qi, and all the yang qi of the body is rooted in the life gate fire. Stirring consumes yang qi at the same time as it transforms and consumes yin essence. In particular, stirring of heart and/or liver fire due to emotional stress, excitement and anger or the stirring of excessive sexual desire and activity may stir ministerial fire to flame upward and become hyperactive above. Last but not least, many so-called recreational drugs which are acrid, warm, up bearing, out-thrusting, and scattering may also cause upward stirring of ministerial fire. – This includes marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, opiods, and hallucinogens. It also includes coffee, alcohol, and tobacco.
Bob Flaws has referenced from somewhere that coffee is acrid, warm, up bearing, out-thrusting, and scattering. My question is how does this description explain the diuretic and purgative affect?
Coffee is acrid, warm, up bearing, out-thrusting, and scattering may also cause upward stirring of ministerial fire according to Bob Flaws. Knowing Bob, he came to this conclusion through detailed analysis and appropriate references to respected Chinese medicine sources and journals.
This description explains how it can give a sense of increased energy and act as a diaphoretic. Any comments how the traditional Chinese medicine classification of Coffee above explains the purgative and diuretic effect?
According to traditional Chinese medicine herbal theory, which channel(s) do(es) coffee have an affinity for? This is often a contentious subject within traditional Chinese medicine since many of the main effects of coffee are related to its ability to affect the mind (i.e. inducing wakefulness and insomnia, reducing anxiety, and enhancing cognition). And since, according to traditional Chinese medicine, the mind is housed in the heart, it may appear that coffee is primarily directed to the heart channel. However, it is in my opinion that the tropism of coffee is primarily the liver, secondarily for the heart, and kidneys. The five-element theory illustrates the effect that coffee has on these three channels/organs. The liver over taxes from its mother element, the kidneys. In turn, the liver generates excessively with its child element, the heart.
I agree that coffee’s flavor is predominantly acrid and that its energy is very warm. Acrid herbs that enter the Liver act to up bear (another example is chai hu). Chai hu is acrid and cool, and it up bears qi. Coffee is acrid and warm and seemingly up bears the yang. This up bearing of yang is transferred to the heart where it arouses the mind, which leads to wakefulness, or insomnia, etc.
It is difficult to fit coffee neatly into a Chinese herbal category. It appears that coffee regulates the qi, while at the same time warms the interior. Generally, acrid herbs for releasing the exterior have affinities for the lung (the most superficial organ), or the bladder (the most superficial channel, taiyang). Even though coffee is considered to possess diaphoretic and diuretic actions, I do not think coffee has affinities for either the lung or bladder, and therefore would not be a particularly effective herb for releasing the exterior. Nor does coffee conform to the downward draining purgatives and laxatives categories, despite promoting bowel movements.
The grounds for coffee’s diaphoretic, diuretic, and purgative actions are less orthodox. From extensive self-experimentation, I understand that the diaphoretic action of coffee is a property that relates to coffee overdose. That is, an excessive consumption of coffee brings about diaphoresis, along with a host of other adverse effects: jitters (stirring of liver wind), and anxiety (disturbed mind). Diaphoresis and anxiety occur when coffee’s dispersing action excessively diffuses heart qi. The diuretic and purgative actions for the most part stem from the over taxation of the kidney and less so from any direct action on the fu organs. This seems a reasonable explanation, since the kidney controls the lower two orifices (1).