Традиционная китайская медицина рассматривает человека как часть природы и органически целое, центральное место в котором занимают "плотные" и "полые" органы, а внутренние коммуникации обеспечивается  системой меридианов.
Все явления окружающего мира, включая  человека и природу, интерпретируются китайской медициной как взаимодействие между двумя началами ян представляющими собой противоположные аспекты единой действительности. Возникновение и развитие болезни рассматриваются китайской медициной как результат борьбы между защитными силами организма и вызывающим болезнь нарушением, как проявление неуравновешенности между ян или как результат внутренних причин, действующих внутри человеческого организма. В книге «Нэй-цзин» сказано: «Там, куда проникает вызывающее болезнь нарушение, определенно имеется недостаток ци» и «Туда, где находятся защитные силы, не проникает вызывающее болезнь нарушение».
В области диагностики болезней китайская медицина использует:
    1.Четыре метода исследования
    2.Восемь руководящих принципов
    3.Синдромы плотных и полых органов, шести каналов
    4.Синдромы трех обогревателей
При лечении заболеваний наибольшее внимание китайская медицина уделяет профилактике их возникновения. В этом отношении в настоящее время, как и тысячелетия назад, находит применение принцип «лечить пациента прежде, чем возникнет болезнь». Основным правилом лечения является устранение причины заболевания. К терапевтическим правилам относится также лечение пациента при строгом учете его индивидуальной предрасположенности, географического положения и времени года.

Категория:Традиционная китайская медицина
Категория:Альтернативные медицинские системы
Категория:Фармация

thumb|right|300px|Traditional Chinese medicine shop in [[Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong]]

'''Traditional Chinese Medicine''' (also known as '''TCM''', ) includes a range of traditional medical practices originating in  China.
It is considered a Complementary or Alternative Medical system in most of the world. 

TCM practices include theories, diagnosis and treatments such as herbal medicine, massage; often Qigong is also strongly affiliated with TCM. 

TCM theories derive from many sources including the theory of Five Phases, the human body Channel system, Zang Fu organ theory, and others.

==History==
Much of the Chinese belief that the life and activity of individual human beings have an intimate relationship with the environment at all scales.<ref>Su Wen, chapter 3</ref> It has also been noted that early Traditional Chinese Medicine stemmed from Taoist masters who had an extra ordinary sense of the body and its workings through their many hours of meditation. This may be why TCM also inherited many of the principles inherent to Daoism (Taoism).

During the golden age of his reign from 2698 to 2596 B.C, as a result of a dialogue with his minister Ch'i Pai (岐伯), the Yellow Emperor is supposed by Chinese tradition to have composed his '''Neijing Suwen (內經  素問)''' or ''Basic Questions of Internal Medicine'', also known as the ''Huangdi Neijing''. Modern scholarly opinion holds that the extant text of this title was compiled by an anonymous scholar no earlier than the Han dynasty just over two-thousand years ago.

During the anesthetized patients during surgery with a formula of wine and powdered hemp. Hua's physical, surgical, and herbal treatments were also used to cure headaches, dizziness, internal worms, fevers, coughing, blocked throat, and even a diagnosis for one ill lady that she had a dead Jin dynasty practitioner and advocate of acupuncture and moxibustion, Huang-fu Mi (215 - 282 AD), also quoted the Yellow Emperor in his ''Jia Yi Jing'' (甲乙經), ca. 265 AD. During the Tang dynasty, Wang Ping claimed to have located a copy of the originals of the ''Neijing Suwen'', which he expanded and edited substantially. This work was revisited by an imperial commission during the 11th century AD.

There were noted advances in Chinese medicine during the Emperor Gaozong (r. 649&ndash;683) of the herbs and minerals according to their pharmaceutical uses, but he also took an interest in the capital city, as well as reservoirs and marshes of Hebei.<ref>West, Stephen H. "Cilia, Scale and Bristle: The Consumption of Fish and Shellfish in The Eastern Capital of The Northern Song," ''Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies'' (Volume 47, Number 2, 1987): 595–634.</ref>

Nationalist government elected to abandon and outlaw the practice of CCM as it did not want China to be left behind by scientific progress. For 30 years, CCM was forbidden in China and several people were prosecuted by the government for engaging in CCM. In the 1960s, Mao Zedong finally decided that the government could not continue to outlaw the use of CCM. He commissioned the top 10 doctors (M.D.'s) to take a survey of CCM and create a standardized format for its application. This standardized form is now known as TCM.

Today, Traditional Chinese Medicine is what is taught in nearly all TCM schools of in China, most of Asia and Northern America. To learn CCM typically one must be part of a family lineage of medicine. Recently, there has been a resurgence in interest in CCM in China, Europe and United States, as a specialty.

Contact with allergies, or when Western Orthodox medicine failed to relieve patients suffering from chronic ailments. Secondly, TCM provides an alternative to otherwise costly procedures whom many can not afford, or whose insurance refuses to cover. There are also many who turn to TCM to avoid the toxic side effects of pharmaceuticals. On the other hand, there is, for example, no longer a distinct branch of Chinese physics or Chinese biology.

TCM formed part of the barefoot doctor program in the People's Republic of China, which extended public health into rural areas. It is also cheaper to the PRC government, because the cost of training a TCM practitioner and staffing a TCM hospital is considerably less than that of a practitioner of Western medicine; hence TCM has been seen as an integral part of extending health services in China.

There is some notion that TCM requires supernatural forces or even cosmology to explain itself.  However most historical accounts of the system will acknowledge it was invented by a culture of people that were already tired of listening to shamans trying to blame illnesses on evil spirits;<ref>"It could be said that the theory of the 5 Elements, and its application to medicine, marks the beginning of what one might call 'scientific' medicine and a departure from Shamanism.  No longer do healers look for a supernatural cause of disease: they now observe Nature and, with a combination of the inductive and deductive method, the set out to find patterns within it and, by extension, apply these in the interpretation of disease" - from an introductory textbook used by many acupuncture courses - </ref> any reference to supernatural forces is usually the result of romantic translations or poor understanding and will not be found in the Taoist-inspired classics of acupuncture such as the Nèi Jīng or Zhēnjiǔ Dàchéng.  The system's development has, over its history, been analysed both skeptically and extensively, and the practice and development of it has waxed and waned over the centuries and cultures through which it has travelled<ref></ref> - yet the system has still survived thus far.  It is true that the focus from the beginning has been on pragmatism, not necessarily understanding of the mechanisms of the actions - and that this has hindered its modern acceptance in the West.  This, despite that there were times such as the early 18th century when "acupuncture and moxa were a matter of course in polite European society"<ref>Needham et al[1980], p. 296</ref>

=== Timeline ===
thumb|right|250px|Products for sale in a traditional medicine market in [[Xi'an ]] 
The history of TCM can be summarized by a list of important doctors and books. 
*Unknown, ''Huáng Dì Nèi Jīng'' (黃帝內經)(Classic of Internal Medicine by Emperor Huang) - Sù Wèn (素問) & Líng Shū (靈樞). The earliest classic of TCM passed on to the present. 

* Warring States Period (5th century BC to 221 BC): Silk scrolls recording channels and collaterals, Zu Bi Shi Yi Mai Jiu Jing (Moxibustion Classic of the Eleven Channels of Legs and Arms), and Yin Yang Shi Yi Mai Jiu Jing (Moxibustion Classic on the Eleven Yin and Yang Channels)

* Eastern Han Dynasty (206 BC–AD 220) to Three Kingdoms Period (220 - 280 AD): 
** Zhen Jiu Zhen Zhong Jing (Classic of Moxibustion and Acupuncture Preserved in a Pillow) by Huà Tuó (華佗)
** Shang Han Za Bing Lun, also known as Shāng Hán Lùn (Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Diseases) by Zhāng Zhòngjǐng (張仲景)

*Huángfǔ Mì (皇甫謐). 

* Tang Dynasty (June 18, 618–June 4, 907)<!--Do we really need the exact days?-->
**Sūn Sīmiǎo (孫思邈)
** Wai Tai Mi Yao (Arcane Essentials from the Imperial Library) by Wang Tao

* Song Dynasty (960 – 1279):
** Tóngrén Shūxué Zhēn Jiǔ Tú Jīng (Illustrated Manual of the Practice of Acupuncture and Moxibustion at (the Transmission) (and other) Acu-points, for use with the Bronze Figure) by Wáng Wéi Yī (王惟一).
**Emergence of Wenbing School

* Huá Shòu (滑壽).

* Ming Dynasty (1368 to 1644): Climax of acupuncture and Moxibustion. Many famous doctors and books. Only name a few:
** Zhēnjiǔ Da Quan (A Complete Collection of Acupuncture and Moxibustion) by Xu Feng
** Zhēnjiǔ Jù Yīng Fa Hui (鍼灸聚英??) (An Exemplary Collection of Acupuncture and Moxibustion and their Essentials) by Gāo Wǔ (高武) 
** Zhēnjiǔ Dàchéng (針灸大成)(Compendium of Acupuncture and Moxibustion) by Yang Jizhou, a milestone book.  1601CE, Yáng Jì Zhōu (楊繼洲).
** Běncǎo Gāng Mù (本草綱目)(Lǐ Shízhēn (李時珍), the most complete and comprehensive pre-modern herb book
**Wen Yi Lun by Wu YouShing

* Qing Dynasty(1644-1912):  
**Yi Zong Jin Jian (Golden Reference of the Medical Tradition) by Wu Quan, sponsored by the imperial. 
**Zhen Jiu Feng Yuan (The Source of Acupuncture and Moxibustion) by Li Xuechuan
**Wen Zhen Lun Dz by Ye TianShi
**Wen Bing Tiao Bian(Systematized Identification of Warm Disease) written by Wu Jutong, a Qing dynasty physician, in 1798 C.E.<ref>[http://www.pacificcollege.edu/alumni/newsletters/winter2004/damp_warmth.html Pacific College of Oriental Medicine Alumni<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

== Theory ==
thumb|right|250px|Whole dried animals for sale in a traditional medicine market in [[Xi'an ]] 
The foundation principles of Chinese medicine are not necessarily uniform, and are based on several schools of thought. Received TCM can be shown to be influenced by Taoism, Buddhism, and Neo-Confucianism.<ref name=Unschuld1985></ref>

Since 1200 BC, Chinese academics of various schools have focused on the observable natural laws of the universe and their implications for the practical characterisation of humanity's place in the universe. In the I Ching and other Chinese literary and philosophical classics, Chinese writers described general principles and their applications to health and healing.

Porkert, a Western medical doctor, placed Chinese medical theory in context as:

<blockquote>Chinese medicine, like many other Chinese sciences, defines data on the basis of the inductive and synthetic mode of cognition. Inductivity corresponds to a logical link between two effective positions existing at the same time in different places in space. (Conversely, causality is the logical link between two effective positions given at different times at the same place in space.) In other words, effects based on on positions that are separate in space yet simultaneous in time are mutually inductive and thus are called ''inductive effects''. In Western science prior to the development of electrodynamics and nuclear physics (which are founded essentially on inductivity), the inductive nexus was limited to subordinate uses in protosciences such as astrology. Now Western man, as a consequence of two thousand years of intellectual tradition, persists in the habit of making causal connections first and inductive links, if at all, only as an afterthought. This habit must still be considered the biggest obstacle to an adequate appreciation of Chinese science in general and Chinese medicine in particular. Given such different cognitive bases, many of the apparent similarities between traditional Chinese and European science which attract the attention of positivists turn out to be spurious.<ref name=Porkert1974></ref></blockquote>

== Model of the body ==
thumb|right|200px|An old Chinese medical chart on acupuncture meridians

Traditional Chinese medicine is largely based on the philosophical concept that the human body is a small universe with a set of complete and sophisticated interconnected systems, and that those systems usually work in balance to maintain the healthy function of the human body. The balance of jing ("kidney essence" or "semen"), other five elements, model of the body, notably concerned with the meridian system.  Unlike the Western anatomical model which divides the physical body into parts, the Chinese model is more concerned with function. Thus, the TCM spleen is not a specific piece of flesh, but an aspect of function related to transformation and transportation within the body, and of the mental functions of thinking and studying.

There are significant regional and philosophical differences between practitioners and schools which in turn can lead to differences in practice and theory.

Theories invoked to describe the human body in TCM include:

*Yin or Yang
*Five elements
*Zang Fu theory
*Meridian (Chinese medicine)
*Three jiaos also known as the Triple Burner or the Triple Warmer

The Yin/Yang and five element theories may be applied to a variety of systems other than the human body, whereas Zang Fu theory, meridian theory and three-jiao (Triple warmer) theories are more specific.

There are also separate models that apply to specific pathological influences, such as the Four stages theory of the progression of warm diseases, the Six levels theory of the penetration of cold diseases, and the Eight principles system of disease classification.

== Diagnostics ==

Following a macro philosophy of disease, traditional Chinese diagnostics are based on overall observation of human symptoms rather than "micro" level laboratory tests. There are four types of TCM diagnostic methods: observe (望 wàng), hear and smell (聞 wén), ask about background (問 wèn) and touching (切 qiè).<ref name=Maciocia></ref> The pulse-reading component of the touching examination is so important that Chinese patients may refer to going to the doctor as "Going to have my pulse felt"<ref name=Kaptchuk></ref>

Traditional Chinese medicine is considered to require considerable diagnostic skill.  A training period of years or decades is said to be necessary for TCM practitioners to understand the full complexity of symptoms and dynamic balances. According to one Chinese saying, ''A good (TCM) doctor is also qualified to be a good prime minister in a country''.  Modern practitioners in China often use a traditional system in combination with Western methods.

=== Techniques ===
* Palpation of the patient's radial artery pulse (pulse diagnosis) in six positions
* Observations of patient's tongue, voice, hair, face, posture, gait, eyes, ears, vein on index finger of small children
* Palpation of the patient's body (especially the abdomen, chest, back, lumbar, areas of problem) for tenderness or comparison of relative warmth or coolness of different parts of the body
* Observation of the patient's various odors
* Asking the patient about the effects of their problem.
* Anything else that can be observed without instruments and without harming the patient
* Asking detailed questions about their family, living environment, personal habits, food diet, emotions, menstrual cycle for women, child bearing history, sleep, exercise, and anything that may give insight into the balance or imbalance of an individual.

== Treatment ==
The below methods are considered as part of the Chinese medicine treatment:
# Chinese herbal medicine (中藥)
# Acupuncture(針灸)- Moxibustion, Cupping(拔罐),Gua Sha (刮痧)
# Tui na (推拿) - TuiNa healing massage therapy
# Qigong (氣功) and related breathing and meditation exercise
# Chinese food therapy (食療)
# Physical ChiGong (氣功) exercises such as TaiJiChuan (太極拳), Standing Meditation (站樁功）, Yoga, Brocade BaDuanJin exercises (八段錦) and even perhaps other Chinese martial arts
# ''Die-da'' or ''Tieh Ta'' (跌打) as practiced usually by martial artists who usually know just parts of Chinese medicine as it applies to the therapy of wounds and trauma.
# Some TCM doctors may also utilize esoteric methods that incorporate/reflect personal beliefs or specializations such as FengShui (風水) or astrology (八字)

trauma injury such as bone fractures, sprains, and bruises.  Some of these specialists may also use or recommend other disciplines of Chinese medical therapies (or Western medicine in modern times) if serious injury is involved. Such practice of bone-setting (整骨)is not common in the West.

== Branches ==
Traditional Chinese medicine has many branches, the most prominent of which are the Jingfang (经方学派) and Wenbing (温病学派) schools. The Jingfang school relies on the principles contained in the Chinese medicine classics of the Han and Ming and Qing Dynasty, although in theory the school follows the teachings of the earlier classics as well. Intense debates between these two schools lasted until the Cultural Revolution in mainland China, when Wenbing school used political power to suppress the opposing school.

== Scientific view ==
=== Efficacy ===

Much of the scientific research on TCM has focused on acupuncture.  The effectiveness of acupuncture remains controversial in the scientific community, and a review by Edzard Ernst and colleagues in 2007 found that the body of evidence was growing, research is active, and that the "emerging clinical evidence seems to imply that acupuncture is effective for some but not all conditions".<ref name="pmid17265547"></ref>  Researchers using the protocols of evidence-based medicine have found good evidence that acupuncture is moderately effective in preventing nausea.<ref name="pmid15266478"></ref><ref name="pmid17723973"></ref> A 2008 study suggest that combining acupuncture with  conventional infertility treatments such as IVF greatly improves the success rates of such medical interventions.<ref name="pmid18258932"></ref> There is conflicting evidence that it can treat chronic low back pain,<ref name="pmid15674876"></ref><ref name="pmid15838072"></ref> and moderate evidence of efficacy for neck pain<ref name="Trinh K"></ref><ref></ref> and headache.<ref>[http://www.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab001218.html The Cochrane Collaboration - Acupuncture for idiopathic headache. Melchart D, Linde K, Berman B, White A, Vickers A, Allais G, Brinkhaus B]</ref>  For most other conditions<ref>Cochrane Collaboration. [http://search.cochrane.org/search?q=acupuncture&restrict=review_abstracts&scso_colloquia_abstracts=colloquia_abstracts&client=my_collection&scso_evidence_aid=evidence_aid&scso_review_abstracts=Cochrane_reviews&lr=&output=xml_no_dtd&sub_site_name=Cochrane.org_search&filter=0&site=my_collection&ie=&oe=&scso_newsletters=newsletters&scso_cochrane_org=whole_site&proxystylesheet=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cochrane.org%2Fsearch%2Fgoogle_mini_xsl%2Fcochrane_org.xsl&btnG=Search [Search all Cochrane reviews for "acupuncture"], retrieved 30 January 2008. </ref> reviewers have found either a lack of efficacy (e.g., help in quitting smoking<ref>[http://www.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab000009.html Acupuncture and related interventions for smoking cessation<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>) or have concluded that there is insufficient evidence to determine if acupuncture is effective (e.g., treating shoulder pain<ref>[http://www.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab005319.html Acupuncture for shoulder pain<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>).  While little is known about the mechanisms by which acupuncture may act, a review of neuroimaging research suggests that specific acupuncture points have distinct effects on cerebral activity in specific areas that are not otherwise predictable anatomically.<ref name="pmid16136210"></ref>