Are modern patients different?
Posted on April 16, 2008 by G. Michael Reynolds
So there’s an argument that I hear a lot for the way that TCM in the 21st century treats its patients (which is usually used to well, I don’t want to say excuse…more like account for everything from Qing Dynasty methods to antibiotics and Western diagnostics) which is that modern patients are subject to pathogens and pathologies that simply did not exist in the time of the great Han doctors and therefore the old methods are not effective in the way they were originally presented anymore.
The counter argument is something like “man has two arms, two legs, six Zang, and six Fu, how could he be different now?”
So let’s hear it people.
Filed under: Chinese Medicine
Different pathogens and pathologies don’t necessitate different treatments. Regardless of the manifestation of a disease, the ancient basis of our disease can cover it. Symptoms are always and everywhere the same, classifiable by the very same terminology presented by ZZJ and those more ancient than himself. Is it bleeding? How much? What kind? Are there boils? Where? What is their nature? Does the person have a cough? Chills? Do they have paranoid delusions? What possible symptoms could be presented that we couldn’t classify simply and with no conceptual difficulty? It’s beyond me.
The problem is in thinking that Chinese medicine speaks to materiality. If Chinese medicine treats material pathogens in the sense that your average Western thinker speaks of them, then we have a problem. Bugs evolve. Antibiotic resistance emerges. Maybe… All the more reason to stick to the energetics and the doctors who honored those energetics - ZZJ. The man.
You might make the argument that diseases are more complex now, because of the wide variety of insults on the system. I frankly find this case to be wildly overstated. We’re subjected to new and weird things, yes, but our system has evolved in an environment that throws bugs and dust and weird crap at us faster than we can even conceive. This is nothing new, really. And anyway, ZZJ was well equipped to deal with complex diseases. Jin Gui, anyone? Diseases involving 3 or more conformations are complex and we can deal with that.
Anyway, a rambling answer for a rambling kind of day.
Eric
http://deepesthealth.com
I got nuttin to add to this at present. I’m mighty tired. But the Illustrious K. B. Stickley said something the other day along the lines of “They didn’t have Meth in ZZJ ’s day.”
The unique characteristic of traditional medicine (as I understand it, and not limited to TCM), is that it treats the root cause of illness, rather than trifling with symptoms. So bacterial mutations etc. should not matter much.
I think the more relevant issue is that of “culture-bound syndromes”, which are a natural consequence of disease starting in the mind. According to this modern “scienfitic” concept, European sicknesses are not identical to ancient Chinese ones–zangfu notwithstanding.
Well, to Chinese medicine (not TCM, which is to CM what Wushu is to Chinese martial arts) that in an dof itself would be a Western/materialist idea, as in being concerned with the material aspects of the pathogen rather than the mechanics of the body’s response. By focusing on how the disease behaves, suddenly it’s a whole lot easier to kill the unkillable. it’s like yes theres a million billion virii and bacteria out there, but the way they cause the body to respond reveals their character and weaknesses, and then we got ‘em.
It’s more complicated than this, of course, as you have to consider not just the pathogen (Stressor) but also the condition of the body when it hit and what its doing now (Terrain), which can go as far back as early childhood or even in utero.