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Author's Foreword

Most TCM textbooks and clinical handbooks describe the diagnosis andtreatment of the same major diseases and conditions. These can be eithertraditional Chinese disease categories, such as lateral costal pain, shan qi,and the strangury and turbidity, or they may be modern Western diseasediagnoses, such as cholecystitis, chronic appendicitis, Bell's palsy, andendometriosis. However, patients coming to Western acupuncturists orpractitioners of Chinese medicine often complain of unpleasant or unusualsymptoms which neither modern Western nor contemporary TraditionalChinese Medicine consider diseases in and of themselves. These mayinclude, for instance, dry nose, heavy-headedness, strong smelling armpits,loss of the sense of taste, itchy eyes, coldness in the low back region, tremorof the hands, sweating of the hands, or premature greying of the hair. Thus,these all too commonly encountered complaints do not appear as chapters inour TCM textbooks, and, therefore, we Western practitioners may havetrouble finding out about their TCM diagnosis and treatment. Without delvinginto the Chinese medical literature more deeply, we might even be temptedto say that Chinese medicine does not address many of the complaints of ourWestern patients.

Being fully aware of this difficulty, when studying in China, I made aspecial attempt to discover and collect original information on suchsymptoms or diseases which typically are overlooked in the majority of theliterature. My aim was to enlarge our understanding and to widen ourknowledge so as to increase our clinical efficacy. This has led me to writethe first of this series of practical books for clinical use, classified accordingto the part of the body where these symptoms appear. These books willcover the main, standard or classical diseases of Chinese medicine as well

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Author: Sionneau, Philippe & Lü, Gang

The Treatment of Disease in TCMVol. 5: Diseases of the Chest, Abdomen & Rib-side

The Treatment of Disease in TCM: Diseases of the Chest & Abdomen

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as a host of other minor diseases and complaints which nonetheless appearoften in our real-life patients.

This new approach offers two further advantages besides filling in the gapsin our Western language TCM literature. First, when a patient's majorcomplaint is difficult to diagnose and analyze due to a confused orcomplicated situation and when a thorough knowledge of the usual methodsof diagnosis and of the standard diseases are not sufficient, thesenonstandard or little written about symptoms and diseases can help us tacklethe problem from a different angle.

For example, if the signs and symptoms of sinusitis or rhinitis in one of ourpatients do not clearly fall under the usual pattern discrimination of bi yuan(deep source nasal congestion), we might find our patient's pattern underdry nose (bi gan), nose pain (bi tong), itchy nose (bi yang), bad odor of thenose (bi chou), or acid, sour nose (bi suan) if our patient suffers from oneof these symptoms. Thus we can approach their case from a slightlydifferent perspective.

The second advantage is that this series of books will offer a new and moreexhaustive approach to a number of key symptoms, such as spontaneousperspiration, night sweats, aversion to wind and cold, red cheeks, pale nails,and purple lips. Most current Western language TCM texts only discuss themost basic disease causes and disease mechanisms, patterns and theirtreatments for these symptoms and conditions, and patients often presentwith patterns not included in these texts. The causes and mechanisms ofthese complaints are, in fact, more numerous and varied than most bookscommonly describe. For example, most books emphasize that night sweatsare due to yin vacuity with vacuity heat. But what about heart blood vacuity,spleen vacuity with damp encumbrance, shao yang disease, damp heat, andthe other causes of night sweats? Or take vexatious heat in the five hearts.It is also typically described as a consequence of yin vacuity and vacuityheat. Whereas, it can just as well be caused by depressive heat in the liver,blood stasis, evils hidden in the yin aspect, heat internally depressed, etc.

Author’s Foreword

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Because I am more specialized in internal medicine and Chinese medicinals,I thought it best to ask my friend Lü Gang to compose the acupuncture andmoxibustion treatments. When studying in Wuhan, Lü Gang was the personwho had the deepest influence on my comprehension of Chinese medicine.He proved to be a competent and efficient guide who helped me reach amore subtle understanding of TCM terminology. Thanks to his outstandingabilities, he obtained a Master of Acupuncture & Moxibustion Degree fromthe Nanjing College of TCM and has a thorough knowledge of this art. Itappeared, therefore, quite logical to ask him to collaborate on this series ofbooks, both in gratitude for the help he has given me in the past and becauseI was sure his collaboration would enhance the quality of this series.

The terminology in this book is based on Nigel Wiseman’s Glossary ofChinese Medical Terms and Acupuncture Points, Paradigm Publications,Brookline, MA, 1990 with up-dates and revisions supplied by NigelWiseman through Bob Felt of Paradigm Publications. Other divergencesfrom Dr. Wiseman’s terminology are noted and discussed in the footnotes.

For further information on the use of processed Chinese medicinals, thereader is referred to my book, Pao Zhi: An Introduction to the Use ofProcessed Chinese Medicinals, also published by Blue Poppy Press. It is mybelief that processed medicinals are far more effective than unprocessedmedicinals. In TCM, each specific medicinal is identified not only by itsspecies and part or piece but also by its method of processing. Thus, amedicinal consisting of the same part from the same species is a differentmedicinal if it is processed differently. Obviously, it is extremely importantto use the right medicinal in the right situation, and using processedmedicinals is, in my opinion, an integral part of using the right medicinal.

Hopefully, this book and the others to come in this series will help Westernpractitioners to make progress in the universe of TCM for the benefit ofsuffering people.

Philippe SionneauAugust 15, 1995

ContentsAuthor’s Foreword, v

1 Chest PainXiong Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

2 Chest OppressionXiong Men . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

3 Vexatious Heat in the ChestXiong Zhong Fan Re . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

4 Sweating on the ChestXiong Bu Han Chu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

5 CoughingKe Sou . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

6 Coughing of BloodKe Xue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

7 Hasty PantingChuan Cu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

8 WheezingXiao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

9 Shortage of QiShao Qi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

10 SneezingPen Ti . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

11 Heart PalpitationsXin Ji . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

12 Rib-side PainXie Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

13 Rib-side DistentionXie Zhang . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

14 Axillary Tidal DampnessYe Xiao Chao Shi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

15 Armpit OdorYe Chou . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

16 Dysphagia OcclusionYe Ge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

17 YawningHe Qian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

18 Stomach Duct PainWei Wan Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

19 Lesser Abdominal PainShao Fu Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

20 Lower Abdominal PainXiao Fu Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225

21 Periumbilical PainQi Fu Tong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

22 Abdominal ChillFu Leng . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247

23 Abdominal FullnessFu Man . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255

24 Abdominal DistentionFu Zhang . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269

25 Drum DistentionGu Zhang . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275

26 BorborygmusChang Ming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289

27 HiccupE Ni . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301

28 BelchingAi Qi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313

29 Acid RegurgitationTun Suan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321

30 Clamoring StomachCao Za . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327

31 NauseaE Xin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

32 VomitingOu Tu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349

33 Vomiting of BloodTu Xue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359

34 Poor AppetiteShi Yu Bu Zhen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

35 Increased Intake with Rapid HungeringShan Shi Yi Ji . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381

36 Drowsiness & Fatigue After EatingShi Hou Kun Juan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

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Symptom Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389

Formula Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399

Vol. 5: Diseases of the Chest, Abdomen & Rib-sideThe Treatment of Disease in TCM

Author: Sionneau, Philippe & Lü, Gang

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