Herbal Medicine

Herbal Medicine

Chinese medicine sees a disease condition as the result (or manifestation) of "imbalances" within the body, or between the body and various environmental factors. The aim of Chinese medicine is not to prescribe an herbal agent to treat a particular manifestation, but to help the patient's stressed organ systems operate in a more natural, balanced state.

In Chinese herbal medicine not everyone with the same disease is given the same herbs. This is because each individual's unique constitution and relationship to the environment is evaluated before an herbal prescription is devised.

Every herb is first classified by what are termed the Four Energies (hot, warm, cold, and cool). "Cold" herbs are used for "hot," or "yang," diseases, and "hot" herbs for cool, or "yin" ailments.

In addition to the Four Energies, the herbal practitioner will also consider the phases of diagnosis by using flavor qualities (spicy, sweet, sour, bitter, and salty) when creating a formulation. The Four Movements (to push upward, to push downward, to float, to sink), which describe how herbal agents affect qi flow in the body, are also taken into account. So are the ways herbs can affect fluids through their moistening or drying qualities.

Western herbal remedies involve the use of plants as medicines to restore and maintain health.

Herbal remedies are employed in the western world by practitioners of holistic medicine who believe that all individuals possess an inner vital force that is constantly working to maintain physical, emotional, and mental health. Although they do not discount the germ theory of disease held by conventional western medicine, medical herbalists in the western world say that this theory does not fully explain why people become ill. They argue that many diseases and conditions come about because the individual's inner force or natural immune system is weakened or out of balance. Therefore, they prescribe herbal or plant remedies that are found in nature in order to return an individual's natural inner balance, strengthen the resistance to disease, and maintain good health.

Last updated Sunday, September 11, 2011
Email Dr. Yvonne Brown at dryvonnebrown@earthlink.net
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