Traditional Chinese Medicine vs Western Medicine
The Right Medicine – 对症下药
Having chosen the particular subject of Medicine for our research article, we picked up “The Right Medicine” as our article topic. With the modern advances of science, we, young adults, often ask ourselves who should we follow, scientific reason or traditional remedies?
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a broad range of medicine practices sharing common theoretical concepts which have been developed in China and are based on a tradition of more than 2,000 years, including various forms of herbal medicine, acupuncture, massage (推拿), exercise (气功) and dietary therapy. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an empirical medicine and was developed in the old days in the absence of systemic scientific knowledge. Thus, it is a product of the accumulated clinical observations gathered over centuries of practice.
Traditional Chinese medicine is based on Yingyangism ( the combination of Five Phases theory with Yin-Yang Theory).Yin and yang are ancient Chinese concepts which can be traced back to the Shang dynasty (1600–1100 BC). They represent two abstract and complementary aspects that every phenomenon in the universe can be divided into. Primordial analogies for these aspects are the sun-facing (yang) and the shady (yin) side of a hill. Two other commonly used representational allegories of yin and yang are water and fire. In the yin-yang theory, detailed attributions are made regarding the yin or yang character of things:
Phenomenon
Yin
Yang
Celestial Bodies
Moon
Sun
Gender
Female
Male
Location
Inside
Outside
Temperature
Cold
Hot
Direction
Downward
Upward
Degree of humidity
Damp/Moist
Dry
The concept of yin and yang is also applicable to the human body; for example, the upper part of the body and the back are assigned to yang, while the lower part of the body are believed to have the yin character. Yin and yang characterization also extends to the various body
Having chosen the particular subject of Medicine for our research article, we picked up “The Right Medicine” as our article topic. With the modern advances of science, we, young adults, often ask ourselves who should we follow, scientific reason or traditional remedies?
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a broad range of medicine practices sharing common theoretical concepts which have been developed in China and are based on a tradition of more than 2,000 years, including various forms of herbal medicine, acupuncture, massage (推拿), exercise (气功) and dietary therapy. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an empirical medicine and was developed in the old days in the absence of systemic scientific knowledge. Thus, it is a product of the accumulated clinical observations gathered over centuries of practice.
Traditional Chinese medicine is based on Yingyangism ( the combination of Five Phases theory with Yin-Yang Theory).Yin and yang are ancient Chinese concepts which can be traced back to the Shang dynasty (1600–1100 BC). They represent two abstract and complementary aspects that every phenomenon in the universe can be divided into. Primordial analogies for these aspects are the sun-facing (yang) and the shady (yin) side of a hill. Two other commonly used representational allegories of yin and yang are water and fire. In the yin-yang theory, detailed attributions are made regarding the yin or yang character of things:
Phenomenon
Yin
Yang
Celestial Bodies
Moon
Sun
Gender
Female
Male
Location
Inside
Outside
Temperature
Cold
Hot
Direction
Downward
Upward
Degree of humidity
Damp/Moist
Dry
The concept of yin and yang is also applicable to the human body; for example, the upper part of the body and the back are assigned to yang, while the lower part of the body are believed to have the yin character. Yin and yang characterization also extends to the various body
References: 1.World Health Organization (online 2002) WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2002-2005 [http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/2002/WHO_EDM_TRM_2002.1.pdf] (accessed 11 December 2006) 2.White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy. [http://www.whccamp.hhs.gov/finalreport.html] 3.National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Five year strategic plan. [http://nccam.nih.gov/about/plans/fiveyear/fiveyear.pdf] 4.Rao JK et al. (1999) Use of complementary therapies for arthritis among patients of rheumatologists. Ann Intern Med 131: 409-416 5.Angell M and Kassirer JP (1998) Alternative medicine—the risks of untested and unregulated remedies. N Engl J Med 339: 839-841 6.Ebell MH et al. (2004) Strength of recommendation taxonomy (SORT): a patient-centered approach to grading evidence in the medical literature. Am Fam Physician 69: 548-556 7.Department of Family Medicine and Primary Care, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong. wwong110@hkucc.hku.hk 8.www.EzineArticles.com/1993132 9.wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese_medicine