Chinese traditional medicine

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

The systems of Chinese traditional medicine has been built on 4000 years of empirical knowledge – testing, observing and recording the results of practical experience which is constantly updated and revised. Western drug acceptance relies mainly on the laboratory tests of active ingredients. With western chemical analysis we can learn in more detail how the traditional herbs work and it is being discovered that the empirical knowledge about their values is generally proving to be true. There are added benefits from this chemical analysis; ingredients with specific action are discovered which pinpoint more exactly which group of patients will benefit from a herb, and in other examples a further, previously unknown, active substance is discovered which indicates additional uses for the herb.

However, the reverse process, that is subjecting laboratory western drugs to sufficient years of trial and errors, is much more difficult. The dangers of not doing this are increased by the use of ‘active ingredients’ to create stronger and faster acting drugs because they also create more dangerous side effects. The safety value of the laboratory tests depends on the skill of the testing scientist to imagine every possible danger and test for it. This is clearly difficult, as the Thalidomide and Open drug disasters have shown. There is no substitute for the years of clinical observation which traditional herbs have undergone.