History of Medicine - Wednesday, 03/03 - Period Two

[notsobadatall.livejournal.com]

"My apologies," he said to his class as they walked in, "for being absent the other week. I'm sorry to say that I was unable to come in."

As he'd overslept and then been unable to go out to get to the school building.

"But today, we're doing Chinese medicine. I'm sure some of you are familiar with parts of it, or you've at least heard of it. And some of this... it's hard to call it 'history' as people are still using these concepts and these treatments today all over the world. Acupuncture, acupressure, herbal remedies... a great deal of it has seeped into our understanding of medicine. Let's dig into the basics, however, shall we?"

"Traditional Chinese Medicine, usually known as TCM now, has several different areas from which it draws. Most of it boils down to trying to understand man and attempting to find his place in the cosmos, so when I say that Taoism, Buddhism, and Neo-Confucianism all had a place there, that would be what I mean.

"According to Chinese medicine, the body is a microcosm, a miniature of the universe itself and that it's dis-eases and problems stem from imbalance and a lack of harmony between the forces within it. Not too far from those humors we covered the other week, no?" Nick smiled.

"That balance is between the qi, the life energy, the jing (which is linked to the kidney and sexual organs), the Wun Xing (the five traditional elements), the emotions, and the soul or spirit. Unlike Western medicine, the concern is not with individual parts but with functioning systems, such as the meridians which we'll go into more in depth in a moment.

"Now, unlike most of the other classes, Chinese medicine has a significant amount of modern influence. So I'd like to talk with you about preconceptions, what ideas you think might be helpful or harmful from Chinese medicine... that sort of thing. If we could get started?"

[ OCD is up!]

Comments

Re: Discussion

[notsobadatall.livejournal.com]

"There has been significant discussion about the power of acupuncture and acupressure. Even though by all laws of traditional medical thought, namely Western thought, it shouldn't even work, there has been significant findings that it can be helpful especially in the realm of pain management. What do you think of a technique whose basis is, in many ways, unscientific but has proven both effective and cost effective?"

Re: Discussion

[wantstocheer.livejournal.com]

"Well, I think the idea that the body as a whole works together has merit," Claire said. "So it makes sense to me that something like acupuncture or acupressure would work."

Re: Discussion

[she-sheds.livejournal.com]

"If it is working for the patient and isn't directly damaging to them then I see no harm in something like this. I would personally be wary of it though. I prefer things to be based in science."