WHAT IS CHINESE MEDICINE

Balance. For thousands of years, this has been the defining principle of Chinese Medicine.   When the “body” (meaning the physical body, mind and spirit) is in balance, a person is well.  When the body is out of balance, a person can become ill. Chinese Medicine seeks to harmonize the passive and active forces within the body, known as Yin and Yang, which enhance the life force, known as Qi. (Pronounced “chee”)  This leads to optimum health.

Yin and Yang exist all around us, not just within us.  In nature, opposites are interconnected and interdependent: dark and light, hot and cold, male and female. As human beings we are not separate from, but part of nature, and subject to its laws.  There is always the movement of something towards its opposite in nature, so too in the body. Chinese Medicine acknowledges that nothing exists in a static or isolated state.

Unlike Western Medicine, which views the body as mostly separate entities, with separate specialties for each organ, i.e. nephrology (kidney), otolaryngology (ear/nose/throat), psychology (mind),  Chinese Medicine sees every part of the body, including the mind and spirit, as  intimately connected.  Each organ is part of the greater whole. Each human being is a little universe, part of a greater  universe that is inherently harmonious and organized.  Nature seeks a balance, as does the human body.  Nature restores  itself, so does the body.

Chinese Medicine supports the body in healing itself. It is a comprehensive system of health care that treats the whole person, not just isolated symptoms and organs.  Chinese Medicine fully investigates a person’s experience of pain, sleep, diet, living situation, work conditions, emotional life, exercise routine, medical history and more.  In addition to extensive questioning, the doctor will examine a patient’s tongue, take pulses, and observe everything from animation to complexion. This myriad of information is correlated and interpreted into a pattern diagnosis, which is then formulated into a specific treatment strategy. As no two people are alike, each treatment plan is different.

Chinese Medicine addresses the root causes of ailments, not just the symptoms.  Here again it differs from Western Medicine. For instance, if you were to visit an M.D. for hypothyroidism (an underactive thyroid), the doctor would most likely prescribe a synthetic hormone replacement.  A Doctor of Oriental Medicine would see that as merely treating the symptom, and would instead employ other methods (diet, herbs, acupuncture) to assist the thyroid in functioning normally, so that it produces sufficient hormones on its own.

Chinese Medicine looks to nature for the ingredients to nourish, strengthen and heal the body.  Not only does it use foods and herbs as remedies, it also follows the rhythms and motions of nature, from the lapping of waves to the flapping of a wings, in its physical therapies like massage and martial arts.  With this natural design, treatments work synergistically, with few side-effects. The body responds to what is familiar, and these energies, from foods and movements, exist within us on every level.