Does Chinese Medicine cure disease?
I’m writing an article for a class about using Chinese medicine to deal with common colds and flus. This is one of my passions (I know, weird) and something I feel the general public doesn’t really know about. In the past three years, I’ve suffered two external invasions, one more flu like and one more cold like. During the first two days of both, I went to the clinic. They both resolved the next day, with copious herb intake in the Shang Han Lun style. I’m a believer, you might say. Simply because of my personal experience? No, because of the countless people I’ve seen have similar experiences in clinic.
Everywhere I read about “finding a cure for the common cold” indicates that such a thing has not yet been achieved. The party line goes like this, “While there is no cure for the common cold, there are things you might be able to do to reduce its duration and severity.” Well… yeah. My question is this - how is that not a cure?
The dictionary definitions for cure are many, but the most relevant for our purposes recurrent themes:
A cure is a process
A cure does not indicate that the disease never occurs (that’s more like eradication)
A cure involves treatment
When people talk about “a cure for cancer” I don’t think they mean that cancer would never happen. While a vaccine for cancer (or the common cold) would be nice, usually that doesn’t seem to be what people are discussing. What we want is a way to avoid prolonged suffering and/or death at the hand of the disease process in question. We want, in essence, to reduce the illnesses duration and severity to minimal levels. We want to get better fast and suffer few lasting negative effects from our experience.
I think one other essential piece of the idea of curation involves the ability for the cure in question to be always and everywhere applicable. We wouldn’t call something a cure that sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t. That may be the info behind the claim that no “cure” for the common cold has been found. That being said, under the care of a competent Chinese medical practitioner, I do believe that rectification of cold and flu symptoms can be reliably achieved. If under such circumstances a person still suffers from their symptoms or, perhaps, even worsens (developing phlegm deep in the lungs, for example) this is likely due to some misunderstanding on the part of the practitioner about the pre-existing state of the patient’s body constitution. This is the case, I think, with any medical therapy and any disease. Consider any disorder we consider to be “cured” in modern medical practice. If a person displays with that illness and the therapy is inappropriately applied or some pre-existing condition of the patient renders the therapy ineffective, we don’t cast shadows on the ability of that therapy to be curative for that disease.
For Chinese Medicine, curing a disease simply involves a restoration of the body’s natural balance. Yin and Yang come into appropriate relationship with one another and all the seasons of the body come in their course with a typical expression. The body responds easily to normal daily stresses and no symptoms of blockage (pain, pathological products) exist. Chinese medical therapies, when applied consistently and competently, rectify the state of health for many conditions for many people. Wouldn’t you say?
What is your understanding of “cure”? What would it take for you to consider the common cold to be “cured”? I’ll be interested to read your thoughts in the comments.
Eric
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Tags: chinese-herbs, cold, common cold, cure, cure for the common cold, disease, external invasion, flu, healthRelated posts
Today I watched a man die - Chinese medicine and emergency medicine
About two hours ago along one of the busiest streets in Portland, I held a man (feeling his pulses all the while) as he died from a heart attack. To be fair, I couldn’t stay until the bitter end and the man could have pulled through but I strongly, strongly doubt this.
I was taking the bus from my house to my connection at this busy intersection. When I reached my stop, I pulled the cord and both he and I waited until the bus came to a stop to rise. He was older - probably 55+ and using a cane to walk. He was quite overweight and his breathing was labored. I was walking a good deal quicker than he was and said, “Excuse me” as I passed him on the sidewalk. It seems strange now to realize that those are likely the last words he ever heard. Somehow I was interested in him, I thought about waiting in the intersection with him as he crossed as he seemed not to have the energy to make it all the way before the light changed. He barely made it across. I continued to my connection stop.
I placed my bag on the ground and started to look around. I suddenly had an urge to look behind me and there he was, flat on his back with his red and white striped umbrella and Oregon State Beavers’ cap lying unceremoniously in the street. I ran to him at the same time as another two men ran to him. He wasn’t breathing. I grabbed his arm to find a pulse and found something very slow and ponderous forcing itself against his vessel walls. This was almost immediately followed by an intense fluttering that grew dimmer and dimmer… Yin and Yang were separating. He began to turn blue, the man next to me started CPR as a recently arrived woman called 9-11.
We worked on him for about 7-8 minutes before the paramedics came. During that time he gurgled once or twice and thrust his tongue out as it turned purple. All I could think was, “That’s the color of his heart muscle right now and that is not good.” I felt him leave, but we kept working with him. He grew cold. The paramedics arrived and began their hard work - but got no response. I remained for a short time but knew there was nothing more for me to do, so I left a short time later when my bus arrived.
For the last two hours, I’ve been thinking hard about what I saw. I’ve also been thinking a lot about our medicine. I am never going to be a M.D. I do have CPR training and our program gives us a fair overview of Western medicine. When my fellow students and I discuss the limits of Chinese medicine we usually indicate our boundaries somewhere around the realm of acute heart attacks, intense bacterial and viral infections and, of course, major surgical conditions. I understand that it is best for me to refer patients in these conditions to Western doctors as this is their realm of expertise. I’m happy to do that. However, what about when I’m the only one around? I know our medicine is capable of helping people in dire situations and I am inexplicably drawn to the most severe illnesses and disorders.
We have acupuncture points that are meant to revive consciousness, we have herbs that in certain administrations are meant to reverse terminal conditions. But how far can we go? What do you know about emergency medicine in Chinese medicine? Do you have any experiences with it? I’m going to start doing some investigation - but your thoughts would be most appreciated.
Eric
Tags: Acupuncture, Acute conditions, chinese-medicine, chinese-medicine-research, death, emergencies, emergency-medicineRelated posts
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