chinese medicine: what's your attitude on it?

[kokleong]

Pros:

1) For the poor some form of medical care is better than none.

2) The wholistic approach to medicine has its advantages.

3) Hooray for placebo effects.

Cons:

1) Because of the use of natural products, dosages are uncontrolled and may not be replicable. Though I think the cocktail of chemicals vs a dose of an isolated active ingredient may yet be proven effective.

2) More clinical studies are still required.

3) Pushing endangered animals to extinction.

I've heard my share of stories of how so-called natural ingredients are being steeped with western medicine in sometimes dangerous quantities. Especially with steroids!

I'll remain skeptical.

p/s I remember reading about Mao going for western treatment while TCM was being heavily promoted to the masses. Propaganda?

[holyman]

So he has gone to seek help from a 鐵打 master and he says he is feeling much better now.

good heavens, its '跌打', not '鐡打'. the former means 'injuries from falls and beatings', the latter means 'strong as steel'. imagine the chinese doctor is strong as steel... . well, a 跌打医生 usually treats bones fractures, dislocation, muscle aches etc only, unlike normal tcm doctors who can treat other diseases and prescribe a wider range of medicine.

Personally I would never ever ever use traditional Chinese medicines. I've read that in these traditional medicines there can be substances that are really hard on the liver and the kidneys, possibly even dangerous.

to isolate every single content in chinese medicine and say that it is harmful, is not a clever way to judge chinese medicine. we all know that chlorine and sodium are very poisonous sustances, but when they reacted and becomes the common table salt, we eat them everyday. for these i dont trust the western way of deciding what kind of food is bad for health. they have no full knowledge of the food they are researching on, they only see a spot on the leopard's skin and exaggerated it.

all decent chinese presciptions have at least 3 to 5 different herbs, depending on how bad the person is suffering. usually 1 is for killing the illness, 2 is for countering the possible side effects that 1 have, and 3 is for strengthening the victim's resistance in general. they are like the 'scissors paper and stone' game. serious illness or complicated ones require more different herbs to cure and counter each other. in chinese its called 'the king and the officials' or 'host and guest' theory. the 'king' is to counter the illness, the 'officials' is to contain the king's power.

[Quest]

I thought Dina was studying TCM, wondering if she could say something?

[HashiriKata]

I've heard that Western medicine aims to treat the symtoms directly whereas Chinese medicine concerns more with the causes (such as redressing some imbalance in the body that causes the illness). This seems to explain some basic difference between the two but can anyone shed more light on this?

[skylee]

Chinese medicine concerns more with the causes (such as redressing some imbalance in the body that causes the illness)

-> 固本培元 (this is about everything I know about CTM )

[sandra_49202@yahoo.com]

I love TCM, I make my own formula when ever I get sick, also I study herb every learning them. though the herbs really work you can't just take it for one day if have to be contuione until the condistion clears. Also I found that so many plant have healing effect.

[chapka]

I've heard that Western medicine aims to treat the symtoms directly whereas Chinese medicine concerns more with the causes (such as redressing some imbalance in the body that causes the illness).

Actually, the opposite is closer to the truth. Scientific medicine (which is practiced in Asia and in the West) aims to treat the underlying causes of the disease where possible; antibiotics kill the bacteria which cause disease, for example, and chemotherapy drugs attack cancerous tissue. Of course, they do treat the symptoms as well when necessary; would you rather they didn't give you painkillers (to treat the symptoms) after your surgery (which treats the underlying cause)?

TCM practitioners, up until recently, were totally unable to treat the underlying causes of disease, since these causes, mostly microorganisms and complex biological processes, were simply not understood; instead, TCM practitioners attributed the cause of diseases to energy flow and similar hypotheses which are, simply put, wrong.

This doesn't mean TCM practitioners never hit on any effective treatments empirically, but if those treatments are treating root causes rather than symptoms, it's because of random chance, since the root causes simply were not understood when the treatments were developed. It's also worth noting that there's no evidence that all or even most TCM treatments do anything at all, and the fact that they're generally considered to be safe says more about the lack of testing than about their actual safety. More likely, its track record is closer to that to Traditional European Medicine, which did hit on some effective treatments for treating obvious symptoms or conditions (aspirin for pain, pennyroyal as an abortifacient, etc.) but which also used many treatments which, as it turns out, did much more harm than good (mercury treatments for syphilis, bloodletting for almost everything else).

The best way to treat TCM is as a "first cut" pharmacopeia which have already been selected for pharmacological activity by the tradition; that is, they're more likely than random drugs to have an effect on the body. Those TCM drugs like quinine and artemisinin which prove to have such an effect then need to be sorted out, tested for safety, standardized, and studied. Tradition only takes you so far; then you need science.

It's also worth noting that although most people assume that TCM drugs are gentle, natural and harmless because they're "herbal," this is not the case. Drugs are drugs. Always tell your doctor before mixing medical drugs with TCM preparations, and be aware that some of the ingredients in TCM are powerful drugs that have not been tested for long-term safety.

[woodcutter]

Chinese medicine has been honed for thousands of years, and tests have their limits, or at the very least have not all been done yet. There are some positive things in Chinese medicine which western doctors do not understand well. There are also, no doubt, negative things.

If the western guy can't help you, it's certainly nice to have a second shot at it, so Chinese medicine is here to stay.

Ancient western remedies are on the up too, no doubt.

[CBC]

Chinese medicine saved my life. I was very sick when I was 11 months. After my parents tried all the western medicine in the hospital I was still dying, then someone introduced an old Chinese medicine expert to my parents. I was getting better that night after I had the bitter soup.

[florazheng]

I have been believing that traditional Chinese medicine have magic effect on patients but there are just a few real NICE TCM doctors nowadays. There might be wonder on incurable cases, such as CA. etc. Anyway, just a few lucky dogs as successful examples but there still leaves hope for patients and their families.

I asked this to several my Chinese net friends who are doctors. As Chinese as well as doctors, they told me they don’t really believe TCM.

[ife256]

My name is Dr. E., I hold 2 doctorate degrees. One in Western Medicine & one in Chinese medicine. Chinese medicine is one of the most powerful form of medicine in this planet. The use of herbs & acupuncture make this medical system as poweful as western medicine. It's not a matter of belief or disbelief. Certain type of medicine work better for particular disease. Tibetan & Ayurvedic medicine is also powerful. Western Medicine (scientific) is only 90 years old.

[mixed_girl]

Certain type of medicine work better for particular disease

agree 100%.

[randall_flagg]

Western Medicine (scientific) is only 90 years old

No matter what your stance on any scientific topic may be, you surely don't mean to say that the fact that a specific science/technology only came into being during the last 100 years is something negative?

EDIT: Dr. E, thank you for your post, though! This discussion can greatly profit from someone who knows what he/she is talking about. Although this thread is about our "attitude" towards TCM, professional input is always welcome!

Edited December 22, 2008 at 09:02 PM by randall_flagg

[WHS Editor]

Hi Dr T,

Agree totally with your statement, there is a time and a place for all types of medicine, depending on the patience condition.

I have been working in the natural health industry in Australia and now China for over 12 years and have seen the best of both worlds. TCM for hormone problems in women especially is FAR better than western medicine or even Naturopathic herbs. As a very dear friend of mine Dr John MagChelen (Dr of Nutrition, Acupuncture, Iridology, Naturopathy) once said to me "Drew the Dr's always want to chop you up because they get paid SO much money being a surgeon, but with the right herbs and the right treatment we should almost never need to be chopped up. If you get ran over by a car however, then of course the best Dr to see is the medical Dr". Obviously he also has a great sense of humour.

Drew

[outcast]

For the most part, it is psuedo-science

While some of it can be used in certain applications (such as acupuncture can be used for pain management), for the most part it shouldn't be relied on.

[Lu]

Depends on the problem, I think. Anything clearly broken I'd take to the hospital. But when I slipped on the street and two weeks later my elbow still hurt, I went to a Chinese doctor, he put electricity on it and it really helped. Chinese medicine has its uses.

[BrandeX]

EMS is not Chinese medicine EMS

[ABCinChina]

I don't believe in TCM and think that it's just a placebo effect on the people that use it. My family and even my girlfriend use it and believe it to cure just about anything. Yeah right. Those TCM doctor's have a different formula to cure just about anything. How is that believable?

[WHS Editor]

I have seen first hand of GOOD TCM working for people, of course the operative word is "GOOD". Like a Western Dr the same goes for TCM, there are good ones and bad ones, the same goes for the medicine that is used.

For natural medicine such a multivitamin, the general belief is that it works, that being said there are many Dr's that claim there is no need and they dont work. In fact some are very right, many vitamins on the market actually do very little. Centrum Daily Multivitamin, which is the most sold, most marketed product on the market has a next to zero absorbing rate - also the raw ingredients are mainly synthetic. Thus for TCM, a good Dr, using the purest ingredients with years of study, I am sure it will more than just a placebo affect.

DJC