How Chinese herbal medicine works

• Conventional medicine is Yin, Chinese medicine is Yang.

• Conventional medicine cares about anatomy of human body, Chinese medicine cares about function of human body.

• Conventional medicine cares about pathogen, Chinese medicine cares about how human body reacts to the pathogen.

• Conventional medicine always try to find a silver bullet to the pathogen, Chinese medicine always try to find a way to help human body to fight the pathogen.

• If conventional medicine can't find a pathogen, then there's no treatment; Chinese medicine always have a treatment to strengthen human body.

• There can be countless and ever-changing pathogens in this world, but human body always stays the same, thus the treatment to human body always stay the same.

• There's no chinese herbs that can treat a specific kind of diseases, but chinese herbs specialized in helping the body to fight every kind of diseases.

The history of medicinal herb in China

The history of Chinese people using natural herbs to treat illness and attain well being can date back to 5000 years ago. A legendary man named Shen Nong(means the God of Farming or Agriculture) literary taste every kind of plant and herbs he can find, studying their pharmacology and testing their toxicology. Legend has it that Shen Nong’s digestive tract is all transparent and see-through, so every herbs he swallow, starting from throat and esophagus, to stomach, duodenum, small intestine, and large intestine, can be seen traveling and being metabolized all the way through. Thus he can study how the herbs work on human body with his own experience. Besides eating the herbs himself, Sheng Nong also has a magic tool—a whip—to help him, legend has it that this magic whip works like a testing paper, it would change to different color once it touches herbs of different characteristics, such as hot, warm, cool, cold, neutral, and toxic.

Today people believe that Sheng Nong is an actual person coming from prior civilization which is much more advanced in every aspect compared to the civilization we are currently living in. The systematic knowledge of herbs are passed down from Sheng Nong(maybe it’s a collective name to multiple people from that civilization) to the current human being. The knowledge passed on includes traditional Chinese medicine. As a matter of fact, East Indian people inherit this knowledge too and develop similar holistic and herbal medicine. It shares plenty of common with traditional Chinese medicine with respect to acupuncture and herbs. For example, Indian people believe certain points or locations in human body have special ability to accept and release energy, which is the general idea behind Chinese acupuncture, And East Indian herbal medicine also has similar theoretical foundation as Chinese herbal medicine.

The book that epitomizes Sheng Nong’s work in herbal medicine is Sheng Nong Ben Cao Jing, meaning Sheng Nong’s Herbal Pharmacology. The book includes about 200 different kind of commonly used herbs and plant, from stem, root, bark, leaves, twigs, fungus, to fern, and so on. This herbal collection has since then been expanded down the road during which Chinese people practice herbal medicine. About 400 years ago, in the year of 1590, Ming Dynasty, another mile stone herbal pharmacology book was written by a great man named Li Shi Zhen. This book includes 1892 different kinds of herbs and over 10,000 prescriptions(formula), it indeed is the ultimate complete guide of Chinese herbology. Ever since then, every traditional Chinese medicine doctor would have to study these two books thoroughly before they can practice herbal medicine in China, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan(ROC), and other countries that was influenced by Chinese culture.

Why should you use Chinese?

Human society has long been using herbs to benefit their health and well being, many countries and nations have their own history of using herbs. One of the buzzwords about herbs is that it’s NATURAL. While there’s no doubt about herbs being natural and enjoy quite some advantage against artificial drugs, being natural only doesn’t exactly warrant using herbs for health care purpose. You must have a well designed and time tested theoretical foundation to support the application. But that’s not the case for most the nations in the world except China. The main difference is that other nations’ knowledge of herbs are sporadic and empirical, they might know from experience that one or two herbs is capable of treating certain symptom, but those knowledge are isolated and never develop into a well connected system. On the contrary, Chinese herbs are developed on a solid foundation, which is Yin Yang, and Five Elements. Specifically, the application of Chinese herbs is guided by the following principles:
 
Five taste/flavors(based on Five Element theory): bitter, sweet, sour, acrid, salty. Certain taste has certain effect to certain organs, for example, Ginger is acrid, its target organs are lung, spleen, and stomach, and its effects are induce sweating, clear cold, benefit stomach, arrest vomiting and coughing. In additions, Chinese herbs are categorized by four different nature: cold, cool, hot, and warm. Certain nature would correspond to diseases of opposite nature. Again, take Ginger for example, Ginger is warm, thus it has medicinal effect to disease characterized by cold signs and symptoms, such as common cold. Gypsum is cold, therefore it’s capable of treating diseases characterized by hot signs and symptoms, like epidemic influenza, SARS, etc.

Five colors: Herbs can also be used according to their colors, for example, herbs in red is good for blood circulation and cardiovascular, herbs in yellow is good for stomach(digestion), herbs in green/blue is good for liver and soothing mind, herbs in white is good for lung and all respiratory conditions, herbs in black is good for kidney(endocrine and hormone). According to this, Ginger is good for stomach, and this is in line with general household experience.

Moving direction: Another intricacy of herbs is their characteristics of moving direction, namely, rising, downing, floating, and sinking. Herbs come in various forms and nature. For example, some herbs are roots and stems of plant, which is of higher density, so they naturally have a downing and sinking nature, in contemporary medicine’s words, their target organs are mostly lower part of human body, such as kidney and legs. Some herbs are leaves and flowers, which is very light weight, so they tend to have a floating or rising effect to human body, their target organs are upper part of human body, such as head and shoulders. In doing so, Chinese herbs are able to address different signs and symptoms of diseases and illness. For examples, cold and flu always show signs and symptoms in upper part of human body, like headache, back and shoulder ache, fever, cold, sore throat. Therefore, Chinese herbology would choose herbs like leaves and flowers, or herbs in light weight. For kidney syndrome, or low back pain and back pain, Chinese herbology would choose those herbs like root or stem of plant, which will better target the signs and symptoms.

How are Chinese herbs used in reality?

Traditionally, herbs are predominantly used in the form of herbal tea. Chinese herbalist would prescribe a customized formula upon diagnosis, and boil the mixture of herbs in a clay pot for approximately one hour, then let the patient drink the herbal tea warm. That traditions can be seen by the names of those herbal formulas, for examples, most of the formulas are named like “tea” or “soup”, such as the most commonly used energy tonic “Si Jun Zi Tang”, meaning four gentlemen tea or four gentlemen soup, because this formula is consisted of four kinds of herbs. These days, as fast pace life style becomes pervasive, people try to fast-food everything, including traditional Chinese medicine, because one hour boiling is not exactly the most convenient way to use herbs. People mass produce the herbal tea(in liquid form), concentrate them, and make them into granules or powder, or some would grind the raw herbs into powder, then they would put this granule or powder into capsules or tablet. Although these pills form herbs allow people easy to use, from traditions’ stand point, it’s not necessary the best way to take advantage of herbal tea, it actually lose its original intend and design. What’s worse is that making all herbs pills or tablet would skip one of the most critical procedure that makes herbal tea effective in the first place. Lab test has shown that testing individual herb alone does not yield any significant essence, even Ginseng alone looks pretty obscure compared to pharmaceutical drug. However, once herbs are boiled with particular pot(like clay pot, or some particular metal pot) or multiple herbs boiled together, during which they undergo a profound chemical reaction with each other, the end result will be exponentially greater than individual herbs being tested alone by ordinary lab test.

After all, it’s the herbal tea, not the modern capsules and powders, that has been used over and over for the past several thousand years in China, during which they were subjected to the most intensive and extensive human body test known to mankind history. Their effects and potency were scrutinized and documented meticulously by countless Chinese herbalists.

Therefore, the bottom line is, if you really want to make the most of Chinese herbs, stick to the traditional way, stay away from pills, capsules, and tablets(but that doesn’t include a few herbal formula that was originally designed to be used in the form of powder).

Why would traditional Chinese medicine use clay pot to boil herbs?

These day people don’t exactly use clay pot to boil herbs, due to the fact that clay pot is not commonly used. But tradition has its own point. First, the effects of herbs are only documented in the condition of using clay pot. Secondly, it has its theoretical bases. According to Five Element theory, clay is earth, herbs are wood. Earth is the element conducive to all other elements like metal, wood, fire, and water, as earth is the mother land to grow everything, especially herbs. Therefore, herbs are considered getting along well with clay the most. Nevertheless this opinion is more of the spiritual and holistic domain, readers are advised to weigh between practicality and spirituality.

Why would people use herbs?

People use herbs in various reasons. From my clinical practice, many people use herbs because of household tradition, many nations has certain level of knowledge of herbs, either medicinal or culinary, to benefit their health. Many nations have a long history of using natural product and dislike chemical or artificial drug. Another scenario is people are upset by regular medicine’s aggressive yet inept treatment, thus hoping to find an alternative. Of course, there are large number of people (like many Chinese people, or Korean, Japanese, etc) who would stick to legacy and tradition, insisting to use herbs whenever they can, unless it’s absolutely necessary to seek regular medicine’s help.

But generally, people who use herbs can be categorized by these two main groups:

Medical conditions: People want to address some particular medical conditions and usually these conditions are urgently in need of treatment, such as cold and flu, back pain(sciatica), diabetes, insomnia, constipation, etc. As mentioned above, they have exhausted regular medicine and want to seek alternatives, like Chinese herbs. After all, Chinese herbs are the one and only medicine in China until twenty century, during which it has successfully studied, treated, and cured all kinds of diseases known human history, including cancers.

General health maintenance: People suffer from long standing nuisance but NOT considered ill from regular medicine’s stand point, such as back pain, fatigue, poor memory, and low libido. Western society generally would use dietary supplement like vitamin, mineral, and (western)herbs as a solution. In tradition Chinese medicine, the solution is Chinese herbs. One of the great things about Chinese herbs is that it can be put to medical use as well as dietary use. An adage in traditional Chinese medicine says it well: Medication(herbs) and Food have the same origin. In essence, herbs is food, food is herbs. You may wonder why, but the beauty of Chinese herbs is that its Five Element principle covers everything and anything, any given herb or food can be categorized under one of elements. Again, take Ginger for example, it’s warm and acrid, and the color is yellow, so these characteristics pretty much determine Ginger’s medicinal applications. Based on these Five Element principle, plenty of medicinal herbs are actually food, for example, Chinese Yam, Ginger, Bean and peas, walnuts, sesame seeds, lily bulbs, barley, cinnamon, lotus seeds, chrysanthemum flower, and a lot others. That’s how the other adage came in: (one should use proper) food rather than medicine. As herbology is a common practice not only in medical clinic but day to day living, Chinese people generally know how to benefit themselves with certain ordinary household food.

What kind of diseases can Chinese herbs treat?

Perhaps the better question is what Chinese medicine can help, now, since United States does not recognize Chinese herbs as medicine, at least not yet, so by law, no one can claim he can treat and cure certain medical conditions by Chinese herbs. But legality matter doesn’t change the fact that Chinese herbs are legal medicine in China for three thousand and five hundred years up to now, and have been treating and curing all kinds of diseases successfully.

Simply put, Chinese herbs can treat anything that can be governed by the rules of Yin-Yang, and Five Element. So what is Yin-Yang, Five Element exactly? Well, Yin Yang is a pair of mutually exclusively yet inter-dependent characteristics that can be found underlying all kinds of entities in the Universe, like Man and Woman. And Five Element is five symbolical characteristics(fire, water, wind, wood, earth) that can be found underlying all kinds of entities in the Universe. I’ve got to tell you, it’s rather difficult to find a thing that’s beyond this Yin-Yang domain. As a matter of fact, no, you can’t find those things at all. So does that mean that Chinese herbs can treat any kind of diseases, from Chinese medicine’s stand point, yes. Chinese medicine’s stand point means we see things differently, for example, we don’t exactly care what cause the diseases, whether it’s bacteria, virus, or fungus, whether it’s a cyst, fibroid, or tumor, or even benign tumor or malignant tumor, we don’t care. Instead, we care the characteristics of the signs and symptoms of the disease, was it warm? Cold? Swelling? Or oozing? Hard or soft? Sharp or dull pain? More importantly, we have to boil down all these characteristics to the very bottom: Yin and Yang, do all these characteristics constitute Yin syndrome or Yang syndrome? Once this Yin Yang relationship is sorted out, the rest will be easy, then we just need to apply herbs according to their own Yin Yang characteristics.

Therefore, when a patient comes see us in clinical practice, that telling us “I was diagnosed with breast cancer” means little to us, rather, we want to know the specific signs and symptoms, so that we can develop a pattern as to Yin or Yang nature. Likewise, asking us like “can you treat Parkinson diseases” is not the best question either, if we can identify the underlying Yin-Yang pattern of this patient, we sure can help.

Conditions we treat the most(ordered alphabetically):
Arthritis, Back Pain(sciatica), Cholesterol, Cardio syndrome, Cancer, Constipation, Diabete, Digestive tract syndrome, Discharge, Eczema, Fatigue/Low energy, High blood pressure, Herniated discs, Infertility, Incontinence, Kidney disease, Liver disease, Low libido, Leukemia, Lupus, Menstrual syndrome, Over weight, Potency, Prostate inflammation/swelling, UTI, Yeast infections.

What does herb taste like?

Exotic is the best word to describe it. There’s this myth about herbs that it taste bizarre, or more commonly, bitter, but that’s not always true. In fact, herbs’ taste varies. Since herb is food, food is herb, herbs can actually taste like most of the food we eat and drink day to day. Yes it’s true that some of them may taste bitter, such as those meant to eradicate stomach infection. But some of them may taste sweet too, like those strengthening herbs. Besides bitter and sweet, there are others that may taste funny, a mixture of everything. This is largely due to fact that herbs’ function mostly derives from their tastes and flavors, for example, acrid can improve blood circulation, sour can bind essence, sweet can nourish body, salty can descend, bitter can purge. So imagine a variety of herbs put together and boiled, what will it taste like? However, the taste is only a matter of adaptation and adjustment, if you try it long enough, taste is not a problem at all. There are Chinese people who couldn’t take herbs at all, and there are westerners who love herbs to death as well.

Are there side effects of using Chinese herbs?

The answer is No. It may sound surreal, but it’s true. To understand this, you must first understand how Chinese herbs are used. Chinese herbs usually come into use as a formula, that is, a recipe that comprise several ingredients each of which serves different functions. Typically, one ingredient will serve as leading role like chief, one will serve as supporting role like deputy, another will serve supporting role like assistant, another will serve as supporting role like orderly. So these ingredients work as a team, with the chief leading the way, others will help pave the way doing things like recon, damage control, and back up. This is distinctly different than western drug and pill, which usually is a single chemical structure in essence, without back up and support. Likewise, when herbs are used in single, without a proper combination with other herbs, it’s likely these single herbs will create side effect. But again, Chinese herbology rarely use one single herbs for treatment, a recipe or formula is the norm.

Nevertheless, while theory precludes side effects from using herbs, it’s not uncommon in reality to see some unpleasant reactions from herbs, but that generally is the case of wrongful use, poor design of formula, or even individual’s body constitution sensitivity, not that herb itself has side effect.

How to brew herbal tea

Since herbal tea in essence is a kind of tea, it is also cooked in a similar way like ordinary teas or soups. Generally, herbs of light density, like leaves, flowers, hollow stems, needs shorter time(such as half an hour) to boil. Herbs of high density, like root, stem, or mineral, need longer time(45 minute to one hour) to boil, herbs that has a volatile flavor needs brief boiling(like cinnamon and mint), mineral herbs generally needs extra long boiling(like oyster shell and fossil), since it’s hard to extract the essence. Herbs can also be boiled for second time to make the most of it, however, second time should use half amount of water and time, since it’s been drenched with water and pre-boiled.
 

Why you should use herbal tea and herbal tea only?

In a fast-pace society, people actually want to slow down and take a break
• Herbal tea has been used by billions of Chinese for the past 3000+ years, its efficacy has been repetitively tested, proven, and documented
• Chinese medicinal herbs’ efficacy is predominantly based on the form of herbal tea, not pills, powder, concentrated granule, tablet, nor capsule. Without proper boiling, most of the recipe would not perform their intended functions
• All good things in the world happen slowly but surely. It takes time and effort to attain health and stay healthy, fast-food or band-aid kind of treatment won’t help
• Herbal tea in essence is food or regular tea, so it’s natural and safe, without side effect.