The American Journal of Chinese Medicine

There has been a long use of Simples as drugs of longevity. Among these red substances predominated, red ochre and cinnabar as minerals, ephedra bearing red berries and pomegranate and peach as vegetable products. In China herbalism became a cult of longevity with its legendary founder as Emperor Shen Nung and with the god of longevity finally emerging from the peach as Shou-Sing. To excell simple drugs of longevity the first synthetic drug was prepared a brick red colloidal gold. It was called Chin-I. Gold-cum-herbal juice. Dialectally it was prounounced Kim-Iya, whence Alkimiya in Arabic, and finally alchemy. Chin-I was Herbo-golden drug and also gold-making-juice, a miraculous substance. But it was not blood-red. Now came Chin-Tan, Cinnabar-gold, red like blood. Its redness equalled blood and as such was soul, gold as its acceptor had an everlasting body. Chin-Tan was designed as the ideal drug of longevity. Alchemy started by making and red gold but degenerated, trying to make bullion gold.

Right at the start of research into Tibetan medicine, it is vital to determine the medical terminology and the latter has to be taken from sources. The starting-point is the standard work of the Tibetan doctors, the book rGyud bzhi = Four Treatises (abbreviated title). It is from the texts of this book that we learn the basic principle of Tibetan medicine is the three-part division.

The three humours are wind (rlung), bile (mkhris pa) and phlegm (bad kan). Some of the important characteristics of the three humours are to be found in Part 1 or the rGyud bzhi, in which the System of Tibetan medicine is also described: Chapter 3 (Root A): healthy organism, diseased organism. Chapter 4 (Root B): obervation, palpation, questioning. Chapter 5 (Root C): nutrition, behaviour, medicines, treatments.

We have arranged the characteristics of the three humours in accordance with the three roots of the System. The terms which have been derived from the text show clearly that the three homours are, through diagnostic methods, recognized as types to which specific kinds of treatment are assigned so that one can speak of there being a doctrine of constitution. A systematic description is, therefore, very important in that it is obvious that without a recognition of the types, treatment is impossible.

Alchemy as the art of gold making never existed and had no beginning. It arose as the cult of longevity using simples, like gold and cinnabar, as drugs of longevity. It became alchemy on making the first synthetic drug, Chin-Yeh, Gold-plus-herbal juice, and reached its ideal with Chin-Tan, Gold-plus-cinnabar. The former was red colloidal gold, the latter vermillion with traces of gold. As inscribed character Tan shows crude cinnabar, pulverized, lagigated and filtered on a rectanglar piece of cloth.

Promotion of Acupuncture is the need of time but due to lack of integrated efforts, this target has not been achieved. Acupuncture may prove helpful in solving the basic health problems of developing countries so its promotion is more important for them. Ways and means to promote the art of Acunpuncture internationally are discussed in this article.

In the present study 66 patients suffering from chronic myalgia were given vibratory stimulation as a pain relieving measure. Several of these patients had previously undergone treatments of various kinds without any significant relief. Forty-one patients reported a significant (20%) reduction of pain during vibratory stimulation. The best pain reducing site was found to be either the area of pain, a trigger or acupuncture point outside the painful area. The best pain reducing effect was obtained when the vibratory stimulation was applied with moderate pressure (1.0 kg) over the underlying structures. To obtain a maximal duration of pain relief the stimulation had to be applied for about 30 minutes.

The pain reducing effect of vibratory stimulation at 100 Hz, transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) at 100 Hz, electroacupuncture at 2 Hz as compared to placebo was studied in 36 patients suffering from myalgia. In 29 patients these modes of stimulation produced pain reduction. Out of these patients 18 rated vibratory stimulation, TENS or electroacupuncture as more effective than placebo while 6 patients rated placebo as more effective. Five patients rated the pain suppressive effect of vibratory stimulation, TENS and electroacupuncture as being equal to that of placebo. Four of the patients who experienced pain reduction with peripheral stimulation reported an effect only for one particular type of peripheral stimulation. The present results provide evidence that vibratory stimulation, TENS and electroacupuncture are as efficient pain suppressive measures and superior to placebo. It is suggested on the basis of these findings that vibratory stimulation, TENS and electroacupuncture merit consideration in the choice of treatment of myalgia.

An attempt is made to name most of the acupuncture points in the face and forehead region using anatomic nomenclature known to western medicine. All acupuncture points in the face and forehead region are located along terminal or cutaneous branches of the trigeminal nerve and the motor points formed between muscular branches of the facial nerve to the muscles of facial expression. It is believed such nomenclatures will be comprehensible to basic medical scientists and clinical practitioners who have knowledge of anatomical sciences.

Acupuncture points in the neck region are basically distributed along the terminal branches of the cervical plexus. There are two components of the plexus, cutaneous and muscular. The cutaneous component of the cervical plexus consists of four major branches which are the lesser occipital, great auricular, transverse cervical, and supraclavicular nerves. Practically all of the acupunture points in the neck are found along the routes of these cutaneous nerves. It is suggested that acupuncture points in this region be names according to the anatomical designation of these nerves.

The effects of electroacupunture on leukocytes and plasma protein on X ray-irradiated rats were investigated in the present study. The results showed that X-irradiation had an evident inhibitory effect on the counts of total leukocytes, lymphocytes and neutrocytes, and the concentration of the total plasma protein, plasma albumin, globulin and α- and β-globulin in X-irradiated rats. The electroacupuncture was able to help the X-irradiated rats to recover the counts of the total leukocyte, lymphocyte and neutrocyte. The electroacupuncture had a helpful tendency to recover the concentration of the total plasma protein, albumin, globulin, and α- and β-globulin in the irradiated rats.

Bleeding time in rats was markedly prolonged after the adminstration of the water extract of Hsien-Ho-T'sao. This antihemostatic effect was more marked in the group of i.p. injection of the drug than in the group of p.o. administration for 2 to 7 consecutive days. Blood coagulation studies showed that plasma prothrombin time, activated partial thromboplastin time and stypven time were prolonged, while thrombin time adnd fibrinogen level were not changed. The thromboelastographic recording showed that reation time was prolonged and maximal elasticity of clot was decreased. In addition, ADP- and collagen- induced aggregations of platelet-rich plasma was suppressed. In conclusion, the prolongation of the bleeding time might be due to both anticoagulant and antiplatelet action of the drug.

The eighteeen opposing drugs were to be recognized as absolute incompatibility of Chinese herbs. Ku-Shen (Sophorae Radix) opposed Li-Lu (Veratri Rhizoma) is one of these incompatible drugs. In this study, we attempted to investigate and identify the interactions of these two drugs in the CNS by means of modern pharmacological technics. The results elucidate that toxicity, number of retching movements, change of locomotor activity and the concentration of monoamines; metabolites of Li-Lu can be changed by Ku-Shen. From these results, further evidence was provided that the involvement of Li-Lu and Ku-Shen in the eighteen opposing drugs of Chinese ancient Pentsao are deemed to be significant.